CVE-2023-2640 — On Ubuntu kernels carrying both c914c0e27eb0 and "UBUNTU: SAUCE: overlayfs: Skip

On Ubuntu kernels carrying both c914c0e27eb0 and "UBUNTU: SAUCE: overlayfs: Skip permission checking for trusted.overlayfs.* xattrs", an unprivileged user may set privileged extended attributes on the mounted files, leading them to be set on the upper files without the

01What is this vulnerability?

On Ubuntu kernels carrying both c914c0e27eb0 and "UBUNTU: SAUCE: overlayfs: Skip permission checking for trusted.overlayfs.* xattrs", an unprivileged user may set privileged extended attributes on the mounted files, leading them to be set on the upper files without the appropriate security checks.

02Affected products

Vendor	Product	Versions
Canonical	Ubuntu Kernel	0, 0, 0

03Active exploitation status

Not currently listed on the CISA Known Exploited Vulnerabilities (KEV) catalog. EPSS is the best forward-looking signal — see the EPSS row above.

04Recommended remediation

• Patch to a fixed version listed in the vendor advisory (see references below).
• Mitigate with WAF rules, network egress filters, or feature flags where the patch is not yet available.
• Hunt historical logs for exploitation indicators — see Detection signatures below.

05Technical details

For the full vendor write-up, exploit chains, and reference implementations, see the references list in section 09.

06Detection signatures

Ask SARA in chat to draft a starting detection for this CVE in your stack of choice.

07Related CVEs

No directly-cited follow-up CVEs in the KB record for this advisory. The references list in section 09 carries the vendor cross-references.

08Timeline

• Published: 2023-07-26T01:59:23.543Z
• Last modified: 2024-10-23T14:59:17.779Z

09References

• ubuntu.com — https://ubuntu.com/security/notices/USN-6250-1
• cve.mitre.org — https://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?name=CVE-2023-2640
• wiz.io — https://wiz.io/blog/ubuntu-overlayfs-vulnerability
• lists.ubuntu.com — https://lists.ubuntu.com/archives/kernel-team/2023-July/140923.html