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Public proof of conceptFix available

CVE-2018-19788

A public proof of concept exists; no exploitation attested.

  • Published2018-12-03
  • 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

A flaw was found in PolicyKit (aka polkit) 0.115 that allows a user with a uid greater than INT_MAX to successfully execute any systemctl command.

Timeline

dates in UTC
  1. 2018-12-0306:29CVE publishedNVD

Observed activity

isMalicious corpus · updated 2026-11-03 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-2018-19788?format=txt
  • CSV export: https://api.ismalicious.com/edl/cve/CVE-2018-19788?format=csv
  • TAXII collection of exploited CVEs
  • The EDL and CSV take an API key on the Pro plan.

Versions per branch

NVD
Canonical ubuntu linux
BranchAffectedFixed in
12.4= 12.04no fix published
14.4= 14.04no fix published
16.4= 16.04no fix published
18.4= 18.04no fix published
18.10= 18.10no fix published
Debian debian linux
BranchAffectedFixed in
8.0= 8.0no fix published
9.0= 9.0no fix published
Polkit project polkit
BranchAffectedFixed in
0.115= 0.115no fix published

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

Distribution builds and vendor advisories

Packages from OSV.dev and products from the vendors' CSAF advisories.

version not verifiedVersions not verified: read as OSV.dev and the vendors publish them, not checked against each vendor's release list.

Packages

  • policykit-1Ubuntu:18.04:LTSall versions · fixed in 0.105-20ubuntu0.18.04.4
  • policykit-1Ubuntu:16.04:LTSall versions · fixed in 0.105-14.1ubuntu0.4
  • policykit-1Ubuntu:14.04:LTSall versions · fixed in 0.105-4ubuntu3.14.04.5
  • policykit-1Debian:14all versions · fixed in 0.105-23
  • policykit-1Debian:13all versions · fixed in 0.105-23
  • policykit-1Debian:12all versions · fixed in 0.105-23
  • policykit-1Debian:9all versions · fixed in 0.105-18+deb9u1
  • policykit-1Debian:8all versions · fixed in 0.105-15~deb8u4

31 more package ranges on OSV.dev

Vendor advisories

  • CVE-2018-19788 Red Hat Product Security230 products fixed · 9 known affected

    polkit: Improper handling of user with uid > INT_MAX leading to authentication bypass

    polkit as a component of Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6 · polkit-desktop-policy as a component of Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6 · polkit-devel as a component of Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6 · +6 more

  • RHSA-2019:3232 Red Hat Product Security44 products fixed

    Red Hat Security Advisory: polkit security update

  • RHSA-2019:2046 Red Hat Product Security51 products fixed

    Red Hat Security Advisory: polkit security and bug fix update

Full record on NVD

Fix

  1. Vendor fix Red Hat Product Security RHSA-2019:3232 · 44 productsFor details on how to apply this update, which includes the changes described in this advisory, refer to: https://access.redhat.com/articles/11258
  2. Workaround from the vendor Red Hat Product Security RHSA-2019:3232 · 44 productsDo not allow negative UIDs or UIDs greater than 2147483647.
  3. No fix planned, says the vendor Red Hat Product Security CVE-2018-19788 · 9 productsWill not fix

Advisories and patches

Detection

read 2026-11-03 22:42 UTC
Nuclei template
none so far
ProjectDiscovery
Exploit-DB
no entry
Exploit-DB
Proof-of-concept repositories
4 repositories, unverifiedAbsoZed/CVE-2018-19788d4gh0s7/CVE-2018-19788Ekultek/PoCjhlongjr/CVE-2018-19788
PoC-in-GitHub
Metasploit modules
none listed
Metasploit Framework

Sources

Identifiers

Technical details

CVSS v3 Vector
CVSS:3.0/AV:N/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:H
Published
2018-12-03
Last Modified
2026-06-17
NVD status
Modified
GitHub Advisory
GHSA-4569-2jp2-r7vf

Frequently asked questions

What is CVE-2018-19788?

A flaw was found in PolicyKit (aka polkit) 0.115 that allows a user with a uid greater than INT_MAX to successfully execute any systemctl command.

Is CVE-2018-19788 actively exploited?

A proof-of-concept exploit exists for CVE-2018-19788, but active exploitation has not been confirmed at this time.

What is the CVSS score for CVE-2018-19788?

CVE-2018-19788 has a CVSS v3 base score of 8.8 (HIGH severity), with vector string CVSS:3.0/AV:N/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:H.

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Sources for this record