Medium [CVE-2026-79676] Information disclosure via path traversal with symlink bypass
This medium-severity Red Hat Linux advisory covers CVE-2026-79676 affecting Exploit Intelligence, Lightspeed Core, OpenShift Lightspeed.
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Summary
NLTK versions before 3.10.3 contain a path traversal vulnerability in corpus readers that reopen root-derived paths using built-in open() instead of nltk.pathsec.open(), allowing symlinks to escape trusted roots.
Attackers who stage symlinked corpus files under a trusted data root can disclose outside-root content through normal corpus reader methods like channels(), domains(), and synonyms(). A flaw was found in NLTK.
This path traversal vulnerability allows attackers to bypass security measures by using symbolic links within trusted data roots. By staging specially crafted symlinked corpus files, an attacker can disclose sensitive information from outside the intended data directories.
This could lead to unauthorized access to confidential data. When processing corpus operations like channels(), domains(), or synonyms(), the application fails to enforce path restrictions on symbolic links within data roots.
An attacker capable of staging crafted symlinks in a trusted corpus directory can bypass path controls to disclose arbitrary readable files outside the corpus root. File access remains bounded by local OS discretionary access controls and host container security parameters.
Red Hat severity: Moderate — CVSS 5.9 (CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:H/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:N/A:N). Weakness: CWE-22.
- < 3.10.3
Official advisory · high-confidence parse· fetched 1 hour ago·verify at source
Fixed versions
No fixed release is recorded yet. That does not prove no patch exists — confirm against the vendor advisory.
Official advisory · high-confidence parse· fetched 1 hour ago·verify at source
Mitigation checklist
- Restrict local write permissions on NLTK data and corpus directories to prevent unauthorized staging of symlinked files, or ensure corpus file paths are validated against trusted roots before invoking corpus reader retrieval methods.
Official advisory · high-confidence parse· fetched 1 hour ago·verify at source
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