CVE-2026-48981

MEDIUMPre-NVD 6.76.7—
EchelonGraph scoreMEDIUM confidence

This medium-severity CVE scores 6.7 under a secondary CVSS source (NVD's own analysis pending). EPSS exploit probability: 0.1%, top 98% of all CVEs by exploit prediction. GitHub Security Advisory data not yet ingested — confidence will rise once GHSA publishes (typical lag: hours to days for open-source ecosystem CVEs; never for infrastructure-only CVEs).

Triggered by: NVD CVSS baseline
Sources: epss, secondary
6.7
EchelonGraph verdictMonitorLow exploitation likelihood right now — keep watching.
  • Lower severity and no public exploit yet
CISA-KEV: Not listedEPSS: 0%CVSS: 6.7Exploit: NoneExposed: 0

No vendor fix yet — apply a workaround or compensating control (WAF / firewall / segmentation) and watch for a patch.

pam_usb provides hardware authentication for Linux using ordinary removable media. In versions prior to 0.9.2, pam_usb calls xmlReadFile() with flags=0 when loading the configuration file, allowing libxml2 to process external entity references (XXE), potentially making outbound network connections or local file reads at XML parse time from the context of the authenticating process. The vulnerability requires the configuration file to contain crafted XML entity references. Since pam_usb.conf is root-owned, direct exploitation requires prior write access to the config, but the defence-in-depth impact is significant given that pam_usb.so runs in setuid contexts (sudo, su). This issue has been fixed in version 0.9.2.

CVSS v3
6.7
EG Score
6.7(medium)
EPSS
1.8%
KEV
Not listed

Published

June 18, 2026

Last Modified

June 22, 2026

Advisory Details (2)

Auto-updated Jun 18, 2026
Patch available. Sources: github_release, github.
github Patch Available

xmlReadFile flags=0 permits XXE network entity fetching in conf.c · Advisory · mcdope/pam_usb · GitHub

https://github.com/mcdope/pam_usb/security/advisories/GHSA-96vv-r4wc-28c2
github_release Patch Available

0.9.2 — Security Hardening Release

Patch available: mcdope/pam_usb 0.9.2

https://github.com/mcdope/pam_usb/releases/tag/0.9.2

Weakness Classification(1)

MITRE Common Weakness Enumeration — the root-cause categories this CVE belongs to.

Data Freshness Timeline

(refreshed 13× in last 7d / 47× 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.

  1. 2026-07-15 21:31 UTCEG score recompute
  2. 2026-07-15 16:57 UTCEPSS rescore
  3. 2026-07-15 02:00 UTCEPSS rescore
  4. 2026-07-14 19:41 UTCEG score recompute
  5. 2026-07-13 22:30 UTCEPSS rescore
  6. 2026-07-13 17:01 UTCEG score recompute
  7. 2026-07-13 06:13 UTCEPSS rescore
  8. 2026-07-12 14:36 UTCEG score recompute
  9. 2026-07-11 12:50 UTCEG score recompute
  10. 2026-07-11 08:27 UTCEPSS rescore
  11. 2026-07-10 11:05 UTCEG score recompute
  12. 2026-07-09 19:10 UTCEPSS rescore
  13. 2026-07-09 09:06 UTCEG score recompute
  14. 2026-07-08 15:16 UTCEPSS rescore
  15. 2026-07-08 07:20 UTCEG score recompute
  16. 2026-07-07 13:46 UTCEPSS rescore
  17. 2026-07-07 05:28 UTCEG score recompute
  18. 2026-07-06 16:27 UTCEPSS rescore
  19. 2026-07-06 03:34 UTCEG score recompute
  20. 2026-07-06 02:23 UTCEPSS rescore
  21. 2026-07-05 01:40 UTCEG score recompute
  22. 2026-07-04 06:31 UTCEPSS rescore
  23. 2026-07-03 23:46 UTCEG score recompute
  24. 2026-07-02 22:00 UTCEG score recompute
  25. 2026-07-01 20:14 UTCEG score recompute
Show 22 more
  1. 2026-07-01 15:07 UTCEPSS rescore
  2. 2026-06-30 23:22 UTCEPSS rescore
  3. 2026-06-30 18:29 UTCEG score recompute
  4. 2026-06-29 16:42 UTCEG score recompute
  5. 2026-06-28 14:56 UTCEG score recompute
  6. 2026-06-28 14:07 UTCEPSS rescore
  7. 2026-06-28 04:56 UTCEPSS rescore
  8. 2026-06-28 04:56 UTCEPSS rescore
  9. 2026-06-27 13:10 UTCEG score recompute
  10. 2026-06-27 03:08 UTCEPSS rescore
  11. 2026-06-26 11:24 UTCEG score recompute
  12. 2026-06-25 13:49 UTCEPSS rescore
  13. 2026-06-25 08:22 UTCEG score recompute
  14. 2026-06-24 06:37 UTCEG score recompute
  15. 2026-06-23 21:33 UTCEPSS rescore
  16. 2026-06-23 21:33 UTCEPSS rescore
  17. 2026-06-23 04:50 UTCEG score recompute
  18. 2026-06-22 03:05 UTCEG score recompute
  19. 2026-06-21 00:58 UTCEG score recompute
  20. 2026-06-19 23:08 UTCEG score recompute
  21. 2026-06-18 21:22 UTCEG score recompute
  22. 2026-06-18 21:22 UTCNVD updatefirst tracked

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Frequently asked(5)

What is CVE-2026-48981?
CVE-2026-48981 is a medium vulnerability published on June 18, 2026. pamusb provides hardware authentication for Linux using ordinary removable media. In versions prior to 0.9.2, pamusb calls xmlReadFile() with flags=0 when loading the configuration file, allowing libxml2 to process external entity references (XXE), potentially making outbound network connections or…
When was CVE-2026-48981 disclosed?
CVE-2026-48981 was first published in the National Vulnerability Database on June 18, 2026, with the most recent update on June 22, 2026. EchelonGraph re-ingests CVE updates from NVD on a 2-hour cycle, so this page reflects the latest published state.
Is CVE-2026-48981 actively exploited?
CVE-2026-48981 is not currently on CISA's Known Exploited Vulnerabilities catalog. FIRST EPSS estimates a 1.8% percentile likelihood of exploitation in the next 30 days — higher percentiles indicate greater predicted risk.
What is the CVSS score of CVE-2026-48981?
CVE-2026-48981 has a CVSS v3 base score of 6.7 (NVD).
How do I remediate CVE-2026-48981?
Patch to the fixed version published by the affected vendor. Where vendor advisories exist for CVE-2026-48981, EchelonGraph cross-links them in the Vendor Advisories panel below — those typically contain the canonical remediation steps, fixed version numbers, and any vendor-specific mitigations.

Dependency Blast Radius

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