CVE-2023-32981 is a medium-severity (CVSS 6.3) Out-of-bounds Write vulnerability in org.jenkins-ci.plugins:pipeline-utility-steps. A fix is available for org.jenkins-ci.plugins:pipeline-utility-steps — see the affected versions and patch details below.
Jenkins Pipeline Utility Steps Plugin arbitrary file write vulnerability
Exploitation Status
No confirmed exploitation observed yet
- A successful exploit gives an attacker total control of the affected component, not partial access.
- CISA’s own triage has not observed active exploitation or public proof-of-concept code for this CVE as of its last assessment.
Exploitation and automatability from CISA’s SSVC triage for CVE-2023-32981.
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
org.jenkins-ci.plugins:pipeline-utility-stepsReal-time download stats are indexed for npm and PyPI packages. This vulnerability affects Maven packages — download data is not available via public APIs for these ecosystems.
Description
Jenkins Pipeline Utility Steps Plugin provides the untar and unzip Pipeline steps to extract archives into job workspaces.
Pipeline Utility Steps Plugin 2.15.2 and earlier does not validate or limit file paths of files contained within these archives.
This allows attackers able to provide crafted archives as parameters to create or replace arbitrary files on the agent file system with attacker-specified content.
Pipeline Utility Steps Plugin 2.15.3 rejects extraction of files in tar and zip archives that would be placed outside the expected destination directory.
Affected Packages
| Ecosystem | Package | Vulnerable range | Fix |
|---|---|---|---|
| ☕Maven | org.jenkins-ci.plugins:pipeline-utility-steps | all versions | 2.15.3org.jenkins-ci.plugins:pipeline-utility-steps:2.15.3 |
Affected Products
pipeline utility stepsjenkinsDetection & mitigation playbook
Open-source dependencyDetect
Scan your dependency tree (package-lock.json, pnpm-lock.yaml, requirements.txt, go.sum, etc.) for org.jenkins-ci.plugins:pipeline-utility-steps, including transitive dependencies — a direct dependency you never call can still pull in a vulnerable version.
Fix
Update org.jenkins-ci.plugins:pipeline-utility-steps to 2.15.3 or later, then make sure no transitive (indirect) dependency still pins the vulnerable range — O3 confirms CVE-2023-32981 is resolved across your whole dependency graph.
Workarounds
Stop feeding it untrusted input: reject or quarantine files and payloads from unverified sources until you can upgrade, restrict accepted formats to the ones you actually need, and run the parsing or decoding step in a least-privileged sandbox or short-lived worker so a crash or corrupted read cannot reach the rest of the process.
Fixing This On Your OS
If you run this on a Linux distribution, patch through your package manager against the distro's own security advisory below — it tracks the exact backported fix for your release, which can ship on a different timeline (and sometimes a different severity) than the upstream project.
OpenShift 3.11 is in ELS. Jenkins and its related technologies will not be supported under ELS. Hence, OpenShift 3.11 is marked as affected/won'tfix.
| Product | Fixed in | Advisory |
|---|---|---|
| OCP-Tools-4.12-RHEL-8 | jenkins-2-plugins-0:4.12.1686649756-1.el8 | RHSA-2023:3610 |
| OpenShift Developer Tools and Services for OCP 4.11 | jenkins-2-plugins-0:4.11.1686831822-1.el8 | RHSA-2023:3663 |
| Red Hat OpenShift Container Platform 4.10 | jenkins-2-plugins-0:4.10.1685679861-1.el8 | RHSA-2023:3625 |
Frequently Asked Questions
Is CVE-2023-32981 in your dependencies?
Find it across Maven, including transitive dependencies.