Vulnerability Report

CVE-2026-23954

Title: Arbitrary File Read/Write to RCE in Incus Templating

Arbitrary File Access

Proof Of Concept

No public PoC currently indexed for CVE-2026-23954.

CWE Category CWE-22

Published Date Jan 22, 2026

Modified Date Jan 30, 2026

Exploit Status Not Found

Score 8.7 CVSS v3.1

Exploit Probability (EPSS)

0.79%

Vulnerability Summary

CVE-2026-23954: Incus is a system container and virtual machine manager. Versions 6.21.0 and below allow a user with the ability to launch a container with a custom image (e.g a member of the ‘incus’ group) to use directory traversal or symbolic links in the templating functionality to achieve host arbitrary file read, and host arbitrary file write. This ultimately results in arbitrary command execution on the host. When using an image with a metadata.yaml containing templates, both the source and target paths are not checked for symbolic links or directory traversal. This can also be exploited in IncusOS. A fix is planned for versions 6.0.6 and 6.21.0, but they have not been released at the time of publication.

Impacted Vendors

linuxcontainers 1

Reference Links

https://github.com/lxc/incus/blob/HEAD/internal/server/instance/drivers/driver_lxc.go#L7215 https://github.com/lxc/incus/blob/HEAD/internal/server/instance/drivers/driver_lxc.go#L7294 https://github.com/lxc/incus/security/advisories/GHSA-7f67-crqm-jgh7 https://github.com/user-attachments/files/24473599/template_arbitrary_write.sh https://github.com/user-attachments/files/24473601/templates_arbitrary_write.patch

CVSS v3.1

Source Entity [email protected]

Severity HIGH

8.7

Attack Vector

ADJACENT_NETWORK

Complexity

LOW

Privileges

N/A

Interaction

NONE

Confidentiality

N/A

Integrity

N/A

Availability

N/A

Scope

CHANGED

RAW VECTOR CVSS:3.1/AV:A/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:C/C:H/I:H/A:N

Associated Attack Patterns (CAPEC)

Total: Patterns

CVE-2026-23954 Exploits & PoCs (Proof Of Concept)

No public PoCs found in our database for this CVE.

January 30, 2026 MODIFIED

Vulnerability data updated via NVD.

January 30, 2026 MODIFIED

Vulnerability data updated via NVD.

January 26, 2026 MODIFIED

Vulnerability data updated via NVD.

January 22, 2026 MODIFIED

Vulnerability data updated via NVD.

Attack Vector Matrix

Access Vector ADJACENT_NETWORK

Complexity LOW

Privileges N/A

Interaction NONE

CVSS Vector String


                                    CVSS:3.1/AV:A/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:C/C:H/I:H/A:N

Affected Stack

No specific products linked.