CVE-2026-55480

medium

Assigned by CNA: github_m

Published 2026-10-15 · Modified 2026-10-15

Discuss on Community Propose mitigation

CVSS v3

5.7

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

CVSS v4 NEW

—

not yet in upstream

VIR risk

5.7

Description

OpenPrinting CUPS is an open source printing system for Linux and other Unix-like operating systems. Prior to 2.4.20, copy_model() in scheduler/ipp.c creates a predictable TempDir/<connection-number>.ppd path in an lp-group-writable directory and opens it as root without O_EXCL or O_NOFOLLOW. Exploitation requires an lp-group process able to write that directory to predict the connection-derived name and plant a symlink before the root open, while a privileged add-printer or modify-printer operation using a model PPD triggers copy_model(). The reporter treats an existing lp foothold and the privileged operation as distinct prerequisites, while the maintainer assesses high privileges because installing the relevant filter or administering the printer requires root or print-administrator access. If the race succeeds, the root scheduler follows the symlink and truncates or overwrites a root-writable target with generated PPD data, compromising file integrity or availability. This issue is fixed in version 2.4.20.

Predictions

Exploit likelihood

57%

Patch ETA

—

Heuristic predictions, AS-IS, for prioritization only.

Mitigations

No mitigations published for this CVE yet.

The vendor-content worker queues fetches as references arrive (check back in a few minutes). Or — if you've already worked around this in production — publish your fix to the community-verified tier.

Propose a mitigation on Community Mitigations published via the community go through AI scoring + 2 human reviewers + 7-day silent objection window before landing here with source_tier=community-verified.

OS impact

Debian Affected 4 releases

Version	Package	Status	Fixed in
trixie	`cups`	Affected	—
sid	`cups`	Affected	—
forky	`cups`	Affected	—
bookworm	`cups`	Affected	—

SUSE Tracked 1 release

Version	Package	Status	Fixed in
—	—	Unknown	—

References

CWEs

CWE-59 CWE-377

Community-verified mitigations for this CVE will appear above when contributors publish them.

Verify integrity in audit chain (admin only). AS-IS.