A local privilege escalation vulnerability was found in the ansible.posix authorized_key module. The module's keyfile() function uses os.chown() instead of os.lchown() and opens files without O_NOFOLLOW when managing SSH authorized keys. An unprivileged local user can pre-stage symbolic links in their ~/.ssh directory to redirect file ownership changes to arbitrary system paths when an operator runs the authorized_key task as root, leading to local privilege escalation.

The remote Fedora 43 host has a package installed that is affected by multiple vulnerabilities as referenced in the FEDORA-2026-50e5126be4 advisory.

    - Update to 2.2.1. Fixes rhbz#2479556.
    - Mitigates CVE-2026-11837 (rhbz#2487430, rhbz#2487431, rhbz#2487432)

Tenable has extracted the preceding description block directly from the Fedora security advisory.

Note that Nessus has not tested for these issues but has instead relied only on the application's self-reported version number.

The remote Fedora 44 host has a package installed that is affected by multiple vulnerabilities as referenced in the FEDORA-2026-0f941ecaa6 advisory.

    - Update to 2.2.1. Fixes rhbz#2479556.
    - Mitigates CVE-2026-11837 (rhbz#2487430, rhbz#2487431, rhbz#2487432)

Tenable has extracted the preceding description block directly from the Fedora security advisory.

Note that Nessus has not tested for these issues but has instead relied only on the application's self-reported version number.

It is, therefore, affected by a vulnerability as referenced in the ALAS2023-2026-1932 advisory.

    A local privilege escalation vulnerability was found in the ansible.posix authorized_key module. The     module's keyfile() function uses os.chown() instead of os.lchown() and opens files without O_NOFOLLOW when     managing SSH authorized keys. An unprivileged local user can pre-stage symbolic links in their ~/.ssh     directory to redirect file ownership changes to arbitrary system paths when an operator runs the     authorized_key task as root, leading to local privilege escalation. (CVE-2026-11837)

Tenable has extracted the preceding description block directly from the tested product security advisory.

Note that Nessus has not tested for this issue but has instead relied only on the application's self-reported version number.

The remote Fedora 45 host has a package installed that is affected by multiple vulnerabilities as referenced in the FEDORA-2026-4a0c61a43f advisory.

    Automatic update for ansible-collection-ansible-posix-2.2.1-1.fc45.

    ##### **Changelog**

    ```
    * Wed Jul  8 2026 Maxwell G <maxwell@gtmx.me> - 2.2.1-1
    - Update to 2.2.1. Fixes rhbz#2479556.
    - Mitigates CVE-2026-11837 (rhbz#2487430, rhbz#2487431, rhbz#2487432)

    ```

Tenable has extracted the preceding description block directly from the Fedora security advisory.

Note that Nessus has not tested for these issues but has instead relied only on the application's self-reported version number.

The Linux/Unix host has one or more packages installed that are impacted by a vulnerability without a vendor supplied patch available.

  - A local privilege escalation vulnerability was found in the ansible.posix authorized_key module. The     module's keyfile() function uses os.chown() instead of os.lchown() and opens files without O_NOFOLLOW when     managing SSH authorized keys. An unprivileged local user can pre-stage symbolic links in their ~/.ssh     directory to redirect file ownership changes to arbitrary system paths when an operator runs the     authorized_key task as root, leading to local privilege escalation. (CVE-2026-11837)

Note that Nessus relies on the presence of the package as reported by the vendor.

ID	Name	Product	Family	Severity
327557	Fedora 43 : ansible-collection-ansible-posix (2026-50e5126be4)	Nessus	Fedora Local Security Checks	high
327484	Fedora 44 : ansible-collection-ansible-posix (2026-0f941ecaa6)	Nessus	Fedora Local Security Checks	high
327396	Amazon Linux 2023 : ansible (ALAS2023-2026-1932)	Nessus	Amazon Linux Local Security Checks	high
325542	Fedora 45 : ansible-collection-ansible-posix (2026-4a0c61a43f)	Nessus	Fedora Local Security Checks	high
320361	Linux Distros Unpatched Vulnerability : CVE-2026-11837	Nessus	Misc.	high

Detections

Analytics

CVE-2026-11837

high

Tenable Plugins

high

high

high

high

high