CVE-2023-0591 is a medium-severity (CVSS 5.5) Path Traversal vulnerability in ubi-reader. 1 public exploit or proof-of-concept reference is indexed, so weaponization risk is real. A fix is available for ubi-reader — see the affected versions and patch details below.
Path Traversal in ubi_reader
Exploitation Status
Proof-of-concept exploit code exists
- CISA’s SSVC triage found public proof-of-concept exploit code for this CVE, though no confirmed active exploitation.
Exploitation and automatability from CISA’s SSVC triage for CVE-2023-0591.
EPSS Exploitation Probability
Probability of exploitation in the next 30 days, from FIRST.org EPSS.
How urgent is this, really
Where this sits among everything scored
Real-World Exposure
ubi-readerReal-time download stats are indexed for npm and PyPI packages. This vulnerability affects PyPI packages — download data is not available via public APIs for these ecosystems.
Description
ubireader_extract_files is vulnerable to path traversal when run against specifically crafted UBIFS files, allowing the attacker to overwrite files outside of the extraction directory (provided the process has write access to that file or directory).
This is due to the fact that a node name (dent_node.name) is considered trusted and joined to the extraction directory path during processing, then the node content is written to that joined path. By crafting a malicious UBIFS file with node names holding path traversal payloads (e.g. ../../tmp/outside.txt), it's possible to force ubi_reader to write outside of the extraction directory.
This issue affects ubi-reader before 0.8.5.
Affected Packages
| Ecosystem | Package | Vulnerable range | Fix |
|---|---|---|---|
| 🐍PyPI | ubi-reader | all versions | 0.8.5pip install --upgrade 'ubi-reader==0.8.5' |
Affected Products
ubi readerubi_reader_projectResearch use only. For defensive security, authorized penetration testing, and academic research only. Never execute exploit code against systems without explicit written authorization.
Detection & mitigation playbook
Open-source dependencyDetect
Scan your dependency tree (package-lock.json, pnpm-lock.yaml, requirements.txt, go.sum, etc.) for ubi-reader, including transitive dependencies — a direct dependency you never call can still pull in a vulnerable version.
Fix
Update ubi-reader to 0.8.5 or later, then make sure no transitive (indirect) dependency still pins the vulnerable range — O3 confirms CVE-2023-0591 is resolved across your whole dependency graph.
Workarounds
Resolve every user-supplied path to its canonical form and reject anything that escapes the intended directory, and run the component under an account that has no read or write access outside the directory it legitimately serves.
Frequently Asked Questions
Is CVE-2023-0591 in your dependencies?
Find it across PyPI, including transitive dependencies.