CVE-2026-24049

Published Jan 22, 2026

Last updated 3 months ago

CVSS high 7.1
SSH
Tunneling protocol

Overview

Description
wheel is a command line tool for manipulating Python wheel files, as defined in PEP 427. In versions 0.40.0 through 0.46.1, the unpack function is vulnerable to file permission modification through mishandling of file permissions after extraction. The logic blindly trusts the filename from the archive header for the chmod operation, even though the extraction process itself might have sanitized the path. Attackers can craft a malicious wheel file that, when unpacked, changes the permissions of critical system files (e.g., /etc/passwd, SSH keys, config files), allowing for Privilege Escalation or arbitrary code execution by modifying now-writable scripts. This issue has been fixed in version 0.46.2.
Source
security-advisories@github.com
NVD status
Analyzed
Products
wheel

Risk scores

CVSS 3.1

Type
Primary
Base score
5.5
Impact score
3.6
Exploitability score
1.8
Vector string
CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:L/PR:N/UI:R/S:U/C:N/I:H/A:N
Severity
MEDIUM

Weaknesses

security-advisories@github.com
CWE-22
nvd@nist.gov
CWE-22

Social media

Hype score
Not currently trending

Configurations