pam_usb provides hardware authentication for Linux using ordinary removable media. In versions 0.9.1 and below, pusb_is_loginctl_local() can cause a NULL dereference crash when parsing loginctl output. The function calls popen() and reads the result; if the Remote field is only a newline, fgets() succeeds but strtok_r(buf, "\n", &saveptr) returns NULL. A subsequent strcmp(is_remote, "no") then dereferences NULL, causing undefined behavior (typically SIGSEGV) and crashing the PAM module. This can crash the authenticating process (e.g., sudo, login) and, depending on PAM stack configuration, deny access for all users of the affected service. This issue has been fixed in version 0.9.2.
CVE-2026-48985
This medium-severity CVE scores 5.5 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).
- Lower severity and no public exploit yet
No vendor fix yet — apply a workaround or compensating control (WAF / firewall / segmentation) and watch for a patch.
- CVSS v3
- 5.5
- EG Score
- 5.5(medium)
- EPSS
- 1.7%
- KEV
- Not listed
Published
June 18, 2026
Last Modified
June 22, 2026
Advisory Details (2)
Auto-updated Jun 18, 2026[R6-1] NULL dereference crash in pusb_is_loginctl_local when loginctl returns empty Remote field · Advisory · mcdope/pam_usb · GitHub
https://github.com/mcdope/pam_usb/security/advisories/GHSA-7j6h-wfc2-mg5q0.9.2 — Security Hardening Release
Patch available: mcdope/pam_usb 0.9.2
https://github.com/mcdope/pam_usb/releases/tag/0.9.2Weakness Classification(1)
MITRE Common Weakness Enumeration — the root-cause categories this CVE belongs to.
Data Freshness Timeline
(refreshed 12× in last 7d / 48× 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.
- 2026-07-15 16:57 UTCEPSS rescore
- 2026-07-15 03:13 UTCEG score recompute
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- 2026-07-09 19:10 UTCEPSS rescore
- 2026-07-09 06:54 UTCEG score recompute
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- 2026-07-08 07:34 UTCEG score recompute
- 2026-07-07 13:46 UTCEPSS rescore
- 2026-07-07 08:15 UTCEG score recompute
- 2026-07-06 16:27 UTCEPSS rescore
- 2026-07-06 07:28 UTCEG score recompute
- 2026-07-06 02:23 UTCEPSS rescore
- 2026-07-05 08:07 UTCEG score recompute
- 2026-07-05 02:30 UTCEPSS rescore
- 2026-07-04 08:39 UTCEG score recompute
- 2026-07-04 06:31 UTCEPSS rescore
- 2026-07-03 09:20 UTCEG score recompute
- 2026-07-02 10:02 UTCEG score recompute
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- 2026-07-01 10:43 UTCEG score recompute
- 2026-06-30 23:22 UTCEPSS rescore
- 2026-06-30 11:25 UTCEG score recompute
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- 2026-06-28 14:07 UTCEPSS rescore
- 2026-06-28 12:42 UTCEG score recompute
- 2026-06-28 04:56 UTCEPSS rescore
- 2026-06-28 04:56 UTCEPSS rescore
- 2026-06-27 13:24 UTCEG score recompute
- 2026-06-27 03:08 UTCEPSS rescore
- 2026-06-26 14:06 UTCEG score recompute
- 2026-06-25 14:44 UTCEG score recompute
- 2026-06-25 13:49 UTCEPSS rescore
- 2026-06-24 15:25 UTCEG score recompute
- 2026-06-23 21:33 UTCEPSS rescore
- 2026-06-23 21:33 UTCEPSS rescore
- 2026-06-23 16:07 UTCEG score recompute
- 2026-06-22 16:48 UTCEG score recompute
- 2026-06-21 17:25 UTCEG score recompute
- 2026-06-20 18:05 UTCEG score recompute
- 2026-06-19 18:44 UTCEG score recompute
- 2026-06-18 19:24 UTCEG score recompute
- 2026-06-18 19:23 UTCNVD updatefirst tracked
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