GNU Emacs through 28.2 allows attackers to execute commands via shell metacharacters in the name of a source-code file, because lib-src/etags.c uses the system C library function in its implementation of the ctags program. For example, a victim may use the "ctags *" command (suggested in the ctags documentation) in a situation where the current working directory has contents that depend on untrusted input.
CVE-2022-45939
Score 7.8 from GitHub Security Advisory (severity: HIGH) published 2022-11-28. NVD baseline CVSS 7.8; sources differ by 0.0.
- High severity, but no confirmed exploitation yet
A fix is available — apply it.
- CVSS v3
- 7.8
- EG Score
- 7.8(medium)
- EG Risk
- 35(Track)EG Risk 35/100SSVC: Track
EG Risk is EchelonGraph's 0–100 priority score: it fuses intrinsic severity with real-world exploitation and automatability so you can rank equal-severity CVEs and fix the most dangerous first. Higher = act sooner. Distinct from the 0–10 EG Score (severity).
How it’s computedSeverity78% × 45%Exploitation1% × 40%Automatability0% × 15%Action: Routine — remediate on your standard cadence. - EPSS PROB
- 1%
- EPSS %ILE
- 50%
- KEV
- Not listed
Published
November 28, 2022
Last Modified
April 28, 2025
References (10)
- cve@mitrehttps://git.savannah.gnu.org/cgit/emacs.git/commit/?id=d48bb4874bc6cd3e69c7a15fc3c91cc141025c51
- cve@mitrehttps://lists.debian.org/debian-lts-announce/2022/12/msg00046.html
- cve@mitrehttps://lists.fedoraproject.org/archives/list/package-announce%40lists.fedoraproject.org/message/FOSK3J7BBAEI4IITW2DRUKLQYUZYKH6Y/
- cve@mitrehttps://lists.fedoraproject.org/archives/list/package-announce%40lists.fedoraproject.org/message/GOXIH2FDEQJEAARE52C3GHTLGQFBYPIB/
- cve@mitrehttps://www.debian.org/security/2023/dsa-5314
- af854a3a-2127-422b-91ae-364da2661108https://git.savannah.gnu.org/cgit/emacs.git/commit/?id=d48bb4874bc6cd3e69c7a15fc3c91cc141025c51
- af854a3a-2127-422b-91ae-364da2661108https://lists.debian.org/debian-lts-announce/2022/12/msg00046.html
- af854a3a-2127-422b-91ae-364da2661108https://lists.fedoraproject.org/archives/list/package-announce%40lists.fedoraproject.org/message/FOSK3J7BBAEI4IITW2DRUKLQYUZYKH6Y/
- af854a3a-2127-422b-91ae-364da2661108https://lists.fedoraproject.org/archives/list/package-announce%40lists.fedoraproject.org/message/GOXIH2FDEQJEAARE52C3GHTLGQFBYPIB/
- af854a3a-2127-422b-91ae-364da2661108https://www.debian.org/security/2023/dsa-5314
Patch Availability(5)
| Vendor / Ecosystem | Fixed in / Patch | Released | Source |
|---|---|---|---|
| ubuntu | emacs24-common (24.5+1-6ubuntu1.1+esm1) @ xenial | 2026-05-25 | ubuntu |
| ubuntu | emacs-nox (1:26.3+1-1ubuntu2+esm1) @ focal | 2026-05-25 | ubuntu |
| redhat | emacs-1:26.1-7.el8_6.3 | 2024-03-05 | redhat |
| redhat | emacs-1:26.1-9.el8 | 2023-05-16 | redhat |
| redhat | emacs-1:27.2-8.el9 | 2023-05-09 | redhat |
Patches are aggregated from vendor advisories (Red Hat, Microsoft, Cisco, GitHub) and package ecosystems (OSV, GHSA). Multiple rows for the same upstream release have been deduplicated.
Affected Packages
(7 across 5 ecosystems)
Debian:11(2)
| Package | Vulnerable range | Fixed in | Dependents |
|---|---|---|---|
| emacs | 1:27.1+1-3.1 | 1:27.1+1-3.1+deb11u1 | — |
| xemacs21 | 21.4.24-10, 21.4.24-11, 21.4.24-12, 21.4.24-9 | — | — |
Debian:12(2)
| Package | Vulnerable range | Fixed in | Dependents |
|---|---|---|---|
| emacs | — | 1:28.2+1-8 | — |
| xemacs21 | — | 21.4.24-11 | — |
Debian:10(1)
| Package | Vulnerable range | Fixed in | Dependents |
|---|---|---|---|
| emacs | 1:26.1+1-3.2, 1:26.1+1-3.2+deb10u1, 1:26.1+1-3.2+deb10u2 | 1:26.1+1-3.2+deb10u3 | — |
Debian:13(1)
| Package | Vulnerable range | Fixed in | Dependents |
|---|---|---|---|
| emacs | — | 1:28.2+1-8 | — |
Debian:14(1)
| Package | Vulnerable range | Fixed in | Dependents |
|---|---|---|---|
| emacs | — | 1:28.2+1-8 | — |
Weakness Classification(1)
MITRE Common Weakness Enumeration — the root-cause categories this CVE belongs to.
All Vendor Advisories
(6)
Every vendor that published an advisory referencing this CVE — pulled from our cve_vendor_advisories aggregation. Click any row for the vendor's original advisory page.
- Microsoft MSRCCVE-2022-459392022-12-02
GNU Emacs through 28.2 allows attackers to execute commands via shell metacharacters in the name of a source-code file because lib-src/etags.c uses the system C library function in its implementation of the ctags program. For example a victim may use the "ctags *" command (suggested in the ctags documentation) in a situation where the current working directory has contents that depend on untrusted input.
- Red HatRHSA-2023:2366MODERATE2022-11-27
RHSA-2023:2366 — Moderate
- Red HatRHSA-2023:3042MODERATE2022-11-27
RHSA-2023:3042 — Moderate
- Red HatRHSA-2024:1103MODERATE2022-11-27
RHSA-2024:1103 — Moderate
- UbuntuUSN-5781-1MEDIUM
Emacs vulnerability
- UbuntuUSN-7027-1MEDIUM
Emacs vulnerabilities
Data Freshness Timeline
(refreshed 4× in last 7d / 27× in last 30d)
Each row is a source pipeline that fetched or updated this CVE on that date, with what changed. For example, "NVD update" means NVD published or revised its analysis for this CVE; "MITRE cvelistV5" means we ingested or refreshed it from the CNA feed. Most recent first.
Showing the most recent 100 of 161 total refreshes for this CVE.
- 2026-09-19 15:38 UTCEPSS rescore
- 2026-09-16 14:05 UTCEPSS rescore
- 2026-09-16 05:10 UTCEPSS rescore
- 2026-09-15 03:07 UTCEPSS rescore
- 2026-09-13 16:44 UTCEPSS rescore
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- 2026-09-11 09:33 UTCEPSS rescore
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- 2026-09-07 15:58 UTCEPSS rescore
- 2026-09-06 13:45 UTCEPSS rescore
- 2026-09-05 15:25 UTCEPSS rescore
- 2026-09-04 22:54 UTCOSV refresh
- 2026-09-04 13:57 UTCEPSS rescore
- 2026-09-04 05:04 UTCEPSS rescore
- 2026-09-02 14:09 UTCEPSS rescore
- 2026-09-01 13:51 UTCEPSS rescore
- 2026-08-30 19:15 UTCEPSS rescore
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- 2026-08-30 01:19 UTCEPSS rescore
- 2026-08-28 21:38 UTCEPSS rescore
- 2026-08-27 14:22 UTCEPSS rescore
- 2026-08-26 14:43 UTCEPSS rescore
- 2026-08-25 13:46 UTCEPSS rescore
- 2026-08-24 14:13 UTCEPSS rescore
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- 2026-08-23 00:17 UTCEPSS rescore
- 2026-08-21 23:46 UTCEPSS rescore
- 2026-08-20 22:53 UTCEPSS rescore
- 2026-08-19 17:01 UTCEPSS rescore
- 2026-08-19 17:01 UTCEPSS rescore
- 2026-08-18 13:45 UTCEPSS rescore
- 2026-08-18 10:04 UTCOSV refresh
- 2026-08-17 13:44 UTCEPSS rescore
- 2026-08-16 14:53 UTCEPSS rescore
- 2026-08-16 14:53 UTCEPSS rescore
- 2026-08-16 02:12 UTCEPSS rescore
- 2026-08-15 01:27 UTCEPSS rescore
- 2026-08-13 21:58 UTCEPSS rescore
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- 2026-08-12 13:48 UTCEPSS rescore
- 2026-08-11 13:39 UTCEPSS rescore
- 2026-08-09 13:44 UTCEPSS rescore
- 2026-08-08 16:34 UTCEPSS rescore
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- 2026-08-05 19:15 UTCEPSS rescore
- 2026-08-04 10:35 UTCEPSS rescore
- 2026-08-03 10:33 UTCEPSS rescore
- 2026-08-03 05:27 UTCOSV refresh
- 2026-08-02 02:24 UTCEPSS rescore
- 2026-08-02 02:24 UTCEPSS rescore
- 2026-08-01 04:13 UTCEPSS rescore
- 2026-08-01 04:13 UTCEPSS rescore
- 2026-07-30 16:25 UTCEPSS rescore
- 2026-07-30 16:25 UTCEPSS rescore
- 2026-07-30 01:28 UTCEPSS rescore
- 2026-07-28 15:34 UTCEPSS rescore
- 2026-07-26 14:52 UTCEPSS rescore
- 2026-07-26 14:52 UTCEPSS rescore
- 2026-07-25 14:15 UTCEPSS rescore
- 2026-07-24 14:15 UTCEPSS rescore
- 2026-07-23 14:16 UTCEPSS rescore
- 2026-07-23 02:15 UTCEG score recompute
- 2026-07-22 23:03 UTCEG score recompute
- 2026-07-22 14:06 UTCEPSS rescore
- 2026-07-21 15:23 UTCEPSS rescore
- 2026-07-21 15:23 UTCEPSS rescore
- 2026-07-20 17:05 UTCEPSS rescore
- 2026-07-19 14:29 UTCEPSS rescore
- 2026-07-19 02:27 UTCEPSS rescore
- 2026-07-19 02:27 UTCEPSS rescore
- 2026-07-18 10:03 UTCEPSS rescore
- 2026-07-18 10:03 UTCEPSS rescore
- 2026-07-16 14:49 UTCOSV refresh
- 2026-07-15 16:56 UTCEPSS rescore
- 2026-07-15 16:56 UTCEPSS rescore
- 2026-07-15 01:58 UTCEPSS rescore
- 2026-07-13 22:28 UTCEPSS rescore
- 2026-07-13 06:11 UTCEPSS rescore
- 2026-07-12 05:44 UTCEPSS rescore
- 2026-07-11 08:25 UTCEPSS rescore
- 2026-07-11 08:25 UTCEPSS rescore
- 2026-07-09 19:08 UTCEPSS rescore
- 2026-07-08 15:12 UTCEPSS rescore
- 2026-07-07 13:44 UTCEPSS rescore
- 2026-07-06 16:25 UTCEPSS rescore
- 2026-07-06 02:21 UTCEPSS rescore
- 2026-07-05 02:28 UTCEPSS rescore
- 2026-07-04 06:29 UTCEPSS rescore
- 2026-07-02 16:58 UTCEPSS rescore
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- 2026-06-30 23:20 UTCEPSS rescore
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- 2026-06-29 14:04 UTCEPSS rescore
- 2026-06-29 14:04 UTCEPSS rescore
- 2026-06-28 14:06 UTCEPSS rescore
- 2026-06-28 13:19 UTCOSV refresh
- 2026-06-28 04:54 UTCEPSS rescore
- 2026-06-28 04:54 UTCEPSS rescore
- 2026-06-27 03:07 UTCEPSS rescore
Related CVEs(same vendor + same CWE)
Same vendor
8 shownredhat:RHSA-2024:1103 · ubuntu:USN-7027-1
Same CWE
10 shownCWE-78
Frequently asked(5)
What is CVE-2022-45939?
When was CVE-2022-45939 disclosed?
Is CVE-2022-45939 actively exploited?
What is the CVSS score of CVE-2022-45939?
How do I remediate CVE-2022-45939?
Dependency Blast Radius
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