VulnerabilityPublished 2 Sep 2026Updated 27 Oct 2026

CVE-2026-81726: NLTK · Model-artifact APIs bypass pathsec and touch files outside allowed roots

Affects acronymSource GCVE Database

Not known to be exploited · CVSS 7.0 High : upgrade to 2.0.0_6 soon.

Data as of 27 Oct 2026, 06:43 UTC

CVSS 3.1 base score

7.0High

How severe the flaw is on the 0–10 CVSS scale.

Patch: Available – fixed in 2.0.0_6

CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:H/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:L/A:L

Attack Vector: Network
Attack Complexity: High
Privileges Required: None
User Interaction: None
Scope: Unchanged
Confidentiality: High
Integrity: Low
Availability: Low

Bold values are the worst case: easiest to exploit or largest impact.

Attack Vector: Network: The vulnerable component is bound to the network stack and the set of possible attackers extends beyond the other options listed, up to and including the entire Internet. Such a vulnerability is often termed 'remotely exploitable' and can be thought of as an attack being exploitable at the protocol level one or more network hops away (e.g., across one or more routers).
Attack Complexity: High: A successful attack depends on conditions beyond the attacker's control. That is, a successful attack cannot be accomplished at will, but requires the attacker to invest in some measurable amount of effort in preparation or execution against the vulnerable component before a successful attack can be expected. For example, a successful attack may require an attacker to: gather knowledge about the environment in which the vulnerable target/component exists; prepare the target environment to improve exploit reliability; or inject themselves into the logical network path between the target and the resource requested by the victim in order to read and/or modify network communications (e.g., a man in the middle attack).
Privileges Required: None: The attacker is unauthorized prior to attack, and therefore does not require any access to settings or files to carry out an attack.
User Interaction: None: The vulnerable system can be exploited without any interaction from any user.
Scope: Unchanged: An exploited vulnerability can only affect resources managed by the same security authority. In this case, the vulnerable component and the impacted component are either the same, or both are managed by the same security authority.
Confidentiality: High: There is total loss of confidentiality, resulting in all resources within the impacted component being divulged to the attacker. Alternatively, access to only some restricted information is obtained, but the disclosed information presents a direct, serious impact.
Integrity: Low: Modification of data is possible, but the attacker does not have control over the consequence of a modification, or the amount of modification is limited. The data modification does not have a direct, serious impact on the impacted component.
Availability: Low: Performance is reduced or there are interruptions in resource availability. Even if repeated exploitation of the vulnerability is possible, the attacker does not have the ability to completely deny service to legitimate users. The resources in the impacted component are either partially available all of the time, or fully available only some of the time, but overall there is no direct, serious consequence to the impacted component.

Definitions: FIRST CVSS v3.1 specification.

Exploitation evidence

Disclosed: evidence found.
CVE published 2 Sep 2026
Detectable: no evidence on record.
No public nuclei template indexed
Weaponised: no evidence on record.
No public exploit code indexed in Metasploit or Exploit-DB
Exploited in the wildExploited: no evidence on record.
Not in CISA KEV and no source reports exploitation
Observed by OffSeq MirageSeen by Mirage: no evidence on record.
No attack traffic recorded by OffSeq Mirage sensors

A missing step is not evidence of safety. Sources: cve.org (opens in a new tab), the Metasploit, Exploit-DB and nuclei-templates index as of 26 Oct 2026.

Disclosed: The CVE record is public on cve.org. Its publication is t = 0.
Detectable: A public nuclei template can find exposed instances, for defenders and attackers alike.
Weaponised: Public exploit code exists in Metasploit or Exploit-DB, or CISA SSVC or the CVSS exploit maturity reports a public proof of concept.
Exploited in the wild: CISA KEV lists it, CISA SSVC rates exploitation active, or a source reports attacks.
Observed by OffSeq Mirage: OffSeq Mirage honeypot sensors recorded attack traffic for this CVE, or found exposed hosts without attack traffic.

Moments are spaced evenly, not to scale; a dashed line marks a gap of six months or more. Deltas count from t = 0. Sources that give only a date (CISA KEV, Exploit-DB, or a time of exactly 00:00Z) read “same day” rather than hours. Metasploit modules carry the flaw’s disclosure date, not their release date, and nuclei templates carry no date, so both appear above but not on the timeline.

What to do

Upgrade acronym to 2.0.0_6.

Affected software

Product	Affected	Fixed in
Homebrewacronym`pkg:brew/acronym`Other threats	Affected >=2.0.0_3 <2.0.0_6	Fixed in 2.0.0_6

Check your own hosts for these packages with threat-finder (opens in a new tab), our free open-source scanner.

Description

### Summary Several model-artifact APIs still treat caller-controlled model paths as ordinary filenames even when NLTK path security is enforced. The same outside-root paths are rejected by guarded helpers, but these public read and write flows still use raw file APIs. ### Details - **Vulnerability type:** File sandbox bypass - **Affected component:** `TransitionParser.train`, `TransitionParser.parse`, `AveragedPerceptron.save`, `AveragedPerceptron.load`, `PerceptronTagger.save_to_json`, `save_maxent_params` - **Affected versions:** Published `3.9.4` and current source `v3.10.0-rc2` both reproduced. - **Patched versions:** Not yet patched - **Root cause:** Model import and export helpers use built-in `open()` on caller-controlled paths instead of pathsec-aware helpers. `TransitionParser.train()` writes outside allowed roots, `TransitionParser.parse()` reads outside allowed roots, `AveragedPerceptron` bypasses the sandbox in both directions, and adjacent read-side helpers in the same family already show the intended guarded behavior. I confirmed outside-root reads and writes while `pathsec.open()` or the guarded sibling helpers rejected the same paths. ### PoC **Preconditions** - The application enables `pathsec` enforcement and lets untrusted workflows choose model import or export paths. **Steps** 1. Enable `pathsec.ENFORCE=True` and restrict allowed roots to a dedicated sandbox directory. 2. Use public model import or export APIs with paths that point outside that root. 3. Observe the same paths are rejected by negative-control guarded helpers such as `pathsec.open()`, `PerceptronTagger.load_from_json()`, or `load_maxent_params()`. 4. Observe the vulnerable APIs still read or write outside-root files successfully. **Minimal reproducible excerpt** ```text transition_train_exists True transition_parse_loader_read_bytes 13 averaged_load_keys ['bias'] maxent_save wrote ['alwayson.tab', 'labels.txt'] ``` ### Impact Consumers that rely on `pathsec` for local containment can be tricked into reading or overwriting files outside approved roots through normal model persistence and loading APIs. ### Remediation Route all model-path file access through `nltk.pathsec.open()` or existing pathsec-aware helpers, and add regression tests that pair each vulnerable API with a negative control on the same path.

References

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