What’s Vulnerable › Vulnerabilities

CVE-2026-113725: virtualenv bash activate runs commands from an environment name with a backslash before $

• Severity: high (CVSS 7.8 v3.1)
• Exploited in the wild: not listed in CISA KEV
• EPSS: 0.2% probability of exploitation in the next 30 days
• Public exploit or detection template: none known
• Published: 2026-10-20 · updated 2026-10-22
• Weakness: CWE-78

Description

virtualenv is a tool for creating isolated virtual python environments. Prior to 21.14.7, the bash activate script escapes the environment name for only one of the two passes bash makes over PS1, so a backslash in the name undoes the escaping and a name containing \$(...) runs as commands in the user's shell each time bash draws the prompt. This issue is fixed in version 21.14.7.

Affected products

• Pypi Virtualenv: before 21.14.7; 0.8, 0.8.1, 0.8.2, 0.8.3, 0.8.4, 0.9 (+296) — fixed in 21.14.7
• pypa virtualenv: before 21.14.7

How to fix

Upgrade to a fixed version: Pypi Virtualenv 21.14.7. Check the vendor advisory for mitigations.

References

• https://github.com/pypa/virtualenv/commit/c3104e02474b652832a9bbaae79f6e1696296932
• https://github.com/pypa/virtualenv/releases/tag/21.14.7
• https://github.com/pypa/virtualenv/security/advisories/GHSA-vxj4-q4g9-crj7

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