CVE-2018-20482

Publication date 26 December 2018

Last updated 25 August 2025

Ubuntu priority

Low

Why this priority?

Cvss 3 Severity Score

4.7 · Medium

Score breakdown

Description

GNU Tar through 1.30, when --sparse is used, mishandles file shrinkage during read access, which allows local users to cause a denial of service (infinite read loop in sparse_dump_region in sparse.c) by modifying a file that is supposed to be archived by a different user's process (e.g., a system backup running as root).

Status

Package Ubuntu Release Status
tar 20.10 groovy
Not affected
20.04 LTS focal
Not affected
19.10 eoan
Not affected
19.04 disco
Not affected
18.10 cosmic Ignored end of life
18.04 LTS bionic
Fixed 1.29b-2ubuntu0.2
16.04 LTS xenial
Fixed 1.28-2.1ubuntu0.2
14.04 LTS trusty
Fixed 1.27.1-1ubuntu0.1+esm1

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Patch details

For informational purposes only. We recommend not to cherry-pick updates. How can I get the fixes?

Package Patch details
tar

Severity score breakdown

CVSS version: CVSS v3.0

Base score 4.7 · Medium

Vector: CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:H/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:H

References

Related Ubuntu Security Notices (USN)

Other references

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