7.8

CVE-2020-28949: PEAR Archive_Tar Deserialization of Untrusted Data Vulnerability

CVSS: 7.8v3.1HighKEVAnalyzed
AliasesUBUNTU-CVE-2020-28949DEBIAN-CVE-2020-28949
Published 19-11-2020Last modified 21-10-2025
Open JSON

Vulnerability summary

CVE-2020-28949 is a high (CVSS 7.8) vulnerability in PEAR Archive_Tar. It is known to be exploited: CISA lists it, first on 25-08-2022. EPSS estimates a 84.55% chance of exploitation in the next 30 days, higher than 99.7% of scored vulnerabilities. 3 public exploits are recorded.

Overall risk
85/100
0100
Critical · default modelHow is this calculated?
CVSS score
7.8/10
010
High · v3.1 (CVE.org)
EPSS score
84.55%
0%100%
Critical · 0.00 pp in 30 days
KEVListedCISA
RansomwareNone recordedNo known use recorded
Public exploits3github, reference, metasploit

Advisory lineage

Upstream 0 · Downstream 10 · Related 3
DLA-2465-1DLA-2466-1DSA-4817-1MGASA-2020-0453RHSA-2022:6541RHSA-2022:6542

Timeline

  1. 19-11-2020
    PublishedVulnerability first disclosed.
  2. 25-08-2022
    Added to CISA KEVPEAR Archive_Tar Deserialization of Untrusted Data Vulnerability
  3. 15-09-2022
    CISA remediation dueApply updates per vendor instructions.
  4. 21-10-2025
    Last modifiedVulnerability information updated.

Description

Archive_Tar through 1.4.10 has :// filename sanitization only to address phar attacks, and thus any other stream-wrapper attack (such as file:// to overwrite files) can still succeed.

CVSS metrics

5 scores · 4 sources · 2 versions

EPSS trend

Probability

84.55%

Chance of exploitation in the next 30 days

Percentile

100%

Versus all other CVEs

30-day change

0.00 pp

From 84.55% on 19-09-2026

19-09-202619-10-2026
EPSS score
84.55%

Known exploited

Compare KEV catalogs
CISA KEVListed
Added
25-08-2022
Federal due date
15-09-2022

CISA required action

Apply updates per vendor instructions. nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2020-28949

Public exploits

3 found
  • githubUnverified

    Archive Tar

    Maturity: poc

  • referenceUnverified

    Exploit Reference (packetstormsecurity.com)

    Maturity: unknown

  • MetasploitMetasploitremoteVerified

    PEAR Archive_Tar 1.4.10 Arbitrary File Write

    exploit/multi/fileformat/archive_tar_arb_file_write

    Maturity: weaponized

Weaknesses

CWE · root cause

No weakness data has been published for this record.

Affected systems

Debian2 products
  • php-pear< 1:1.10.9+submodules+notgz-1.1
  • debian_linuxEOL9.0 | 10.0
Ubuntu2 products
  • drupal7< 7.26-1ubuntu0.1+esm2 | < 7.44-1ubuntu1~16.04.0+esm2
  • php-pear< 1:1.10.1+submodules+notgz-6ubuntu0.2 | < 1:1.10.5+submodules+notgz-1ubuntu1.18.04.2 | < 1:1.10.9+submodules+notgz-1ubuntu0.20.04.1
Drupal1 product
  • drupal≥ 7.0, < 7.75 | ≥ 8.0.0, < 8.9.10 | ≥ 8.8.0, < 8.8.12 | ≥ 9.0.0, < 9.0.9
Fedoraproject1 product
Php1 product

5 vendors · 7 products

References

20 links
Show all 20 references