Medium [CVE-2026-96281] Flatpak: flatpak: unprivileged active user can bypass anti-downgrade checks for system apps/runtimes
This medium-severity Red Hat Linux advisory covers CVE-2026-96281 affecting Red Hat Enterprise Linux 10, Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7, Red Hat Enterprise Linux 8.
Aggregated and source-linked by VulniPulse. Data sources, validation and limitations.
VulniPulse record published
Android app · Google Play
Monitor future Red Hat Linux CVEs from your phone.
Choose a whole vendor or a precise platform, then receive matching security advisories by phone notification, email, or both. Coverage follows 32 official vendor sources and 160+ reviewed platform categories.
Summary
On a multi-user system, a user with an active local login session could downgrade a system-wide Flatpak app to an older version by removing the app's remote ref via the unprivileged system-helper RemoveLocalRef method, causing the anti-downgrade check to fail to find a reference date.
A malicious local user could use this to expose other users of the same system to an app version with unfixed vulnerabilities. Red Hat estimates the CVSSv3.1 vector from the provided vector CVSS:4.0/AV:P/AC:L/AT:P/PR:L/UI:P/VC:H/VI:H/VA:H/SC:N/SI:N/SA:N.
Specific conditions must exist for the attack to occur and user interaction is required. Red Hat severity: Moderate — CVSS 6.2 (CVSS:3.1/AV:P/AC:H/PR:L/UI:R/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:H).
Weakness: CWE-284. Affected Red Hat products: Red Hat Enterprise Linux 10; Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7; Red Hat Enterprise Linux 8; Red Hat Enterprise Linux 9.
Red Hat does not currently list a fixing RHSA for this CVE.
Affected products named by the advisory: Red Hat package: flatpak.
Affected versions
No affected-version range was extracted from the source record. The vendor advisory is authoritative — check it before change work.
Official advisory · high-confidence parse· fetched 5 days 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 5 days ago·verify at source
Mitigation checklist
- Ensure that Flatpak apps installed system-wide are fully updated before running them.
Official advisory · high-confidence parse· fetched 5 days ago·verify at source
Discussion(0)
No comments yet. Share field notes, upgrade gotchas, or questions — verify against the vendor advisory before acting on community advice.
Sign in to join the discussion.