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Public proof of concept

CVE-2018-11479

A public proof of concept exists; no exploitation attested.

  • Published2018-05-25
  • WeaknessCWE-20

Am I affected?

With a domain, we read the version its public headers and pages expose. A distribution build can carry the fix under an older number.

Description

The VPN component in Windscribe 1.81 uses the OpenVPN client for connections. Also, it creates a WindScribeService.exe system process that establishes a \\.\pipe\WindscribeService named pipe endpoint that allows the Windscribe VPN process to connect and execute an OpenVPN process or other processes (like taskkill, etc.). There is no validation of the program name before constructing the lpCommandLine argument for a CreateProcess call. An attacker can run any malicious process with SYSTEM privileges through this named pipe.

Timeline

dates in UTC
  1. 2020-02-07Exploit-DB entryExploit-DB

Observed activity

isMalicious corpus · updated 2026-11-02 21:37 UTC
Indicators tagged with this CVE, per day0 indicators over 7 days
Block these indicators
  • Firewall list (EDL, text): https://api.ismalicious.com/edl/cve/CVE-2018-11479?format=txt
  • CSV export: https://api.ismalicious.com/edl/cve/CVE-2018-11479?format=csv
  • TAXII collection of exploited CVEs
  • The EDL and CSV take an API key on the Pro plan.

Versions per branch

NVD
Windscribe
BranchAffectedFixed in
1.81= 1.81no fix published

as publishedRanges as NVD and OSV publish them; a distribution’s build can be fixed under an older number.

Fix

No fix published by the sources we read yet. NVD record

Detection

read 2026-11-02 22:42 UTC
Nuclei template
none so far
ProjectDiscovery
Exploit-DB
EDB-48021
Exploit-DB
Proof-of-concept repositories
none listed
PoC-in-GitHub
Metasploit modules
1 moduleexploit/windows/local/windscribe_windscribeservice_priv_escrank: excellentModule metadata: Metasploit Framework, © Rapid7, Inc., BSD-3-Clause.
Metasploit Framework

Sources

Identifiers

Technical details

CVSS v3 Vector
CVSS:3.0/AV:L/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:H
Published
2018-05-25
Last Modified
2026-06-17
NVD status
Modified

Frequently asked questions

What is CVE-2018-11479?

The VPN component in Windscribe 1.81 uses the OpenVPN client for connections. Also, it creates a WindScribeService.exe system process that establishes a \\.\pipe\WindscribeService named pipe endpoint that allows the Windscribe VPN process to connect and execute an OpenVPN process or other processes (like taskkill, etc.). There is no validation of the program name before constructing the lpCommandLine argument for a CreateProcess call. An attacker can run any malicious process with SYSTEM privileges through this named pipe.

Is CVE-2018-11479 actively exploited?

Active exploitation of CVE-2018-11479 has not been confirmed. Its EPSS score was 9.8% on 2026-11-02, the estimated probability of exploitation in the next 30 days.

What is the CVSS score for CVE-2018-11479?

CVE-2018-11479 has a CVSS v3 base score of 7.8 (HIGH severity), with vector string CVSS:3.0/AV:L/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:H.

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Sources for this record