CVE intelligence

CVE-2026-42496

Vulnerability intelligence

Published May 26, 2026Sources checked Sep 27, 2026

9.1CRITICALCVSS out of 10

What this means

Review the available evidence

CVE-2026-42496 and is rated Critical severity with a CVSS score of 9.1. It is not in the current CISA KEV record we collected. That does not prove exploitation has not occurred.

CISA KEVNot listedBased on the latest collected catalog

EPSS0.5%Estimated 30-day exploitation probability

Ransomware useNot markedCISA KEV ransomware field

Threat actors0Source-linked actor relationships

Overview

What is CVE-2026-42496?

Archive::Tar versions before 3.08 for Perl extract symlinks with attacker controlled targets outside the extraction directory. _make_special_file() passes the tar header's linkname to symlink() without validating it against absolute paths or .. segments. The secure-extract mode check that guards regular file extraction does not cover the symlink target. A subsequent open through the extracted name reads or writes the attacker chosen path.