CVE-2018-7311 Vulnerability Analysis & Exploit Details

CVE-2018-7311 Vulnerability Summary

CVE-2018-7311: PrivateVPN 2.0.31 for macOS suffers from a root privilege escalation vulnerability. The software installs a privileged helper tool that runs as the root user. This privileged helper tool is installed as a LaunchDaemon and implements an XPC service. The XPC service is responsible for handling new VPN connection operations via the main PrivateVPN application. The privileged helper tool creates new VPN connections by executing the openvpn binary located in the /Applications/PrivateVPN.app/Contents/Resources directory. The openvpn binary can be overwritten by the default user, which allows an attacker that has already installed malicious software as the default user to replace the binary. When a new VPN connection is established, the privileged helper tool will launch this malicious binary, thus allowing an attacker to execute code as the root user. NOTE: the vendor has reportedly indicated that this behavior is "an acceptable part of their software.

Exploit Prediction Scoring System (EPSS)

The EPSS score estimates the probability that this vulnerability will be exploited in the near future.

EPSS Score: 0.217% (probability of exploit)

EPSS Percentile: 60.22% (lower percentile = lower relative risk)
This vulnerability is less risky than approximately 39.78% of others.

CVE-2018-7311 References

External References

• https://gist.github.com/anonymous/cfc3f3419804b22ee9e82ee8d16a661d
• https://github.com/VerSprite/research/blob/eba22c8b506be6f7128ef5356281915d5667bfff/advisories/VS-2018-004.md
• https://github.com/VerSprite/research/blob/master/advisories/VS-2018-004.md
• https://gist.github.com/anonymous/cfc3f3419804b22ee9e82ee8d16a661d
• https://github.com/VerSprite/research/blob/eba22c8b506be6f7128ef5356281915d5667bfff/advisories/VS-2018-004.md
• https://github.com/VerSprite/research/blob/master/advisories/VS-2018-004.md

CWE Common Weakness Enumeration

CAPEC Common Attack Pattern Enumeration and Classification

• Accessing Functionality Not Properly Constrained by ACLs CAPEC-1 In applications, particularly web applications, access to functionality is mitigated by an authorization framework. This framework maps Access Control Lists (ACLs) to elements of the application's functionality; particularly URL's for web apps. In the case that the administrator failed to specify an ACL for a particular element, an attacker may be able to access it with impunity. An attacker with the ability to access functionality not properly constrained by ACLs can obtain sensitive information and possibly compromise the entire application. Such an attacker can access resources that must be available only to users at a higher privilege level, can access management sections of the application, or can run queries for data that they otherwise not supposed to.
• Privilege Abuse CAPEC-122 An adversary is able to exploit features of the target that should be reserved for privileged users or administrators but are exposed to use by lower or non-privileged accounts. Access to sensitive information and functionality must be controlled to ensure that only authorized users are able to access these resources.
• Directory Indexing CAPEC-127 An adversary crafts a request to a target that results in the target listing/indexing the content of a directory as output. One common method of triggering directory contents as output is to construct a request containing a path that terminates in a directory name rather than a file name since many applications are configured to provide a list of the directory's contents when such a request is received. An adversary can use this to explore the directory tree on a target as well as learn the names of files. This can often end up revealing test files, backup files, temporary files, hidden files, configuration files, user accounts, script contents, as well as naming conventions, all of which can be used by an attacker to mount additional attacks.
• Using Malicious Files CAPEC-17 An attack of this type exploits a system's configuration that allows an adversary to either directly access an executable file, for example through shell access; or in a possible worst case allows an adversary to upload a file and then execute it. Web servers, ftp servers, and message oriented middleware systems which have many integration points are particularly vulnerable, because both the programmers and the administrators must be in synch regarding the interfaces and the correct privileges for each interface.
• Exploiting Incorrectly Configured Access Control Security Levels CAPEC-180 An attacker exploits a weakness in the configuration of access controls and is able to bypass the intended protection that these measures guard against and thereby obtain unauthorized access to the system or network. Sensitive functionality should always be protected with access controls. However configuring all but the most trivial access control systems can be very complicated and there are many opportunities for mistakes. If an attacker can learn of incorrectly configured access security settings, they may be able to exploit this in an attack.
• Signing Malicious Code CAPEC-206 The adversary extracts credentials used for code signing from a production environment and then uses these credentials to sign malicious content with the developer's key. Many developers use signing keys to sign code or hashes of code. When users or applications verify the signatures are accurate they are led to believe that the code came from the owner of the signing key and that the code has not been modified since the signature was applied. If the adversary has extracted the signing credentials then they can use those credentials to sign their own code bundles. Users or tools that verify the signatures attached to the code will likely assume the code came from the legitimate developer and install or run the code, effectively allowing the adversary to execute arbitrary code on the victim's computer. This differs from CAPEC-673, because the adversary is performing the code signing.
• Hijacking a privileged process CAPEC-234 An adversary gains control of a process that is assigned elevated privileges in order to execute arbitrary code with those privileges. Some processes are assigned elevated privileges on an operating system, usually through association with a particular user, group, or role. If an attacker can hijack this process, they will be able to assume its level of privilege in order to execute their own code.
• Reusing Session IDs (aka Session Replay) CAPEC-60 This attack targets the reuse of valid session ID to spoof the target system in order to gain privileges. The attacker tries to reuse a stolen session ID used previously during a transaction to perform spoofing and session hijacking. Another name for this type of attack is Session Replay.
• Session Fixation CAPEC-61 The attacker induces a client to establish a session with the target software using a session identifier provided by the attacker. Once the user successfully authenticates to the target software, the attacker uses the (now privileged) session identifier in their own transactions. This attack leverages the fact that the target software either relies on client-generated session identifiers or maintains the same session identifiers after privilege elevation.
• Cross Site Request Forgery CAPEC-62 An attacker crafts malicious web links and distributes them (via web pages, email, etc.), typically in a targeted manner, hoping to induce users to click on the link and execute the malicious action against some third-party application. If successful, the action embedded in the malicious link will be processed and accepted by the targeted application with the users' privilege level. This type of attack leverages the persistence and implicit trust placed in user session cookies by many web applications today. In such an architecture, once the user authenticates to an application and a session cookie is created on the user's system, all following transactions for that session are authenticated using that cookie including potential actions initiated by an attacker and simply "riding" the existing session cookie.
• Replace Binaries CAPEC-642 Adversaries know that certain binaries will be regularly executed as part of normal processing. If these binaries are not protected with the appropriate file system permissions, it could be possible to replace them with malware. This malware might be executed at higher system permission levels. A variation of this pattern is to discover self-extracting installation packages that unpack binaries to directories with weak file permissions which it does not clean up appropriately. These binaries can be replaced by malware, which can then be executed.

Vulnerable Configurations

• cpe:2.3:a:privatevpn:privatevpn:2.0.31:*:*:*:*:macos:*:*
  cpe:2.3:a:privatevpn:privatevpn:2.0.31:*:*:*:*:macos:*:*

Other 5 Recently Published CVEs Vulnerabilities

• CVE-2025-3801 – A vulnerability was found in songquanpeng one-api up to 0.6.10. It has been classified as problematic. This affects an unknown part of the componen...
• CVE-2025-3800 – A vulnerability has been found in WCMS 11 and classified as critical. Affected by this vulnerability is an unknown functionality of the file app/co...
• CVE-2025-3799 – A vulnerability, which was classified as critical, was found in WCMS 11. Affected is an unknown function of the file app/controllers/AnonymousContr...
• CVE-2025-3798 – A vulnerability, which was classified as critical, has been found in WCMS 11. This issue affects the function sub of the file app/admin/AdvadminCon...
• CVE-2025-3661 – The SB Chart block plugin for WordPress is vulnerable to Stored Cross-Site Scripting via the ‘className’ parameter in all versions up to, and inclu...