Patool before 4.0.5 contains a path traversal vulnerability in the safe_extract() function in patoolib/programs/py_tarfile.py when running on Python before 3.12, where the is_within_directory() helper uses os.path.commonprefix() for character-level string comparison instead of path-level comparison, allowing a crafted archive member path to bypass the containment check. Attackers can supply a malicious archive with specially crafted member paths to write arbitrary files.
https://www.vulncheck.com/advisories/patool-path-traversal-via-safe-extract-function
https://github.com/wummel/patool/releases/tag/4.0.5
https://github.com/wummel/patool/blob/main/doc/changelog.txt
Published: 2026-06-26
Updated: 2026-06-27
Base Score: 6.4
Vector: CVSS2#AV:N/AC:L/Au:N/C:P/I:P/A:N
Severity: Medium
Base Score: 5.4
Vector: CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:R/S:U/C:L/I:L/A:N
Severity: Medium
Base Score: 5.3
Vector: CVSS:4.0/AV:N/AC:L/AT:N/PR:N/UI:P/VC:L/VI:L/VA:N/SC:N/SI:N/SA:N
Severity: Medium
EPSS: 0.00285