Linux Distros Unpatched Vulnerability : CVE-2024-24821

high Nessus Plugin ID 250324

Synopsis

The Linux/Unix host has one or more packages installed with a vulnerability that the vendor indicates will not be patched.

Description

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

- Composer is a dependency Manager for the PHP language. In affected versions several files within the local working directory are included during the invocation of Composer and in the context of the executing user.
As such, under certain conditions arbitrary code execution may lead to local privilege escalation, provide lateral user movement or malicious code execution when Composer is invoked within a directory with tampered files. All Composer CLI commands are affected, including composer.phar's self-update. The following scenarios are of high risk: Composer being run with sudo, Pipelines which may execute Composer on untrusted projects, Shared environments with developers who run Composer individually on the same project. This vulnerability has been addressed in versions 2.7.0 and 2.2.23. It is advised that the patched versions are applied at the earliest convenience. Where not possible, the following should be addressed: Remove all sudo composer privileges for all users to mitigate root privilege escalation, and avoid running Composer within an untrusted directory, or if needed, verify that the contents of `vendor/composer/InstalledVersions.php` and `vendor/composer/installed.php` do not include untrusted code.
A reset can also be done on these files by the following:```sh rm vendor/composer/installed.php vendor/composer/InstalledVersions.php composer install --no-scripts --no-plugins ``` (CVE-2024-24821)

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

Solution

There is no known solution at this time.

See Also

https://ubuntu.com/security/CVE-2024-24821

Plugin Details

Severity: High

ID: 250324

File Name: unpatched_CVE_2024_24821.nasl

Version: 1.1

Type: local

Agent: unix

Family: Misc.

Published: 8/18/2025

Updated: 8/18/2025

Supported Sensors: Frictionless Assessment AWS, Frictionless Assessment Azure, Frictionless Assessment Agent, Nessus Agent, Agentless Assessment, Nessus

Risk Information

VPR

Risk Factor: Medium

Score: 5.9

CVSS v2

Risk Factor: Medium

Base Score: 4.6

Temporal Score: 3.4

Vector: CVSS2#AV:L/AC:L/Au:N/C:P/I:P/A:P

CVSS Score Source: CVE-2024-24821

CVSS v3

Risk Factor: High

Base Score: 7.8

Temporal Score: 6.8

Vector: CVSS:3.0/AV:L/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:H

Temporal Vector: CVSS:3.0/E:U/RL:O/RC:C

Vulnerability Information

CPE: cpe:/o:canonical:ubuntu_linux:22.04:-:lts, p-cpe:/a:canonical:ubuntu_linux:composer

Required KB Items: Host/local_checks_enabled, Host/cpu, global_settings/vendor_unpatched, Host/OS/identifier

Exploit Ease: No known exploits are available

Vulnerability Publication Date: 2/8/2024

Reference Information

CVE: CVE-2024-24821