← back
CVE-2026-41579

runc: Malicious image with /dev symlink can trigger limited host filesystem integrity violations

CVSS 3.3 LOWEPSS 0.2%CWE-61
Vexday Risk Score
8Low
SSVC decision (CISA)
Track
No exploitation signal → monitor
CVSS 3.3EPSS 0.2%KEV nãoPoC Nuclei Metasploit Patch
Lifecycle
01 Jul 2026Published on NVD
Recommendation: Monitor — no exploitation signal at the moment.
runc is a CLI tool for spawning and running containers according to the OCI specification. In versions prior to 1.3.6, 1.4.0-rc.1, 1.4.0-rc.12, 1.5.0-rc.1, and 1.5.0-rc.1, when setting up the container rootfs, setupPtmx and setupDevSymlinks call os.Remove and os.Symlink with a filepath.Join string which allow an image with /dev as a symlink to trick runc into deleting files called ptmx on the host or creating a hardcoded set of symlinks with specific names and targets in an arbitrary pre-existing host directory. This issue is not exploitable under Docker, because Docker creates a top-level read-only layer that masks any malicious /dev symlink present in the container image — unlike some other Linux container tooling, whose higher-level runtimes built on runc remain exposed to exploitation via a malicious image. This issue has been fixed in versions 1.3.6, 1.4.3 and 1.5.0.
CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:L/PR:N/UI:R/S:U/C:N/I:L/A:N
Affected products
opencontainers · runc