PostgreSQL pgAdmin up to 9.18 File Manager servers.json check_access_permission toctou

Summaryinfo

A vulnerability, which was classified as problematic, was found in PostgreSQL pgAdmin up to 9.18. Impacted is the function check_access_permission of the file servers.json of the component File Manager. Such manipulation leads to toctou. This vulnerability is listed as CVE-2026-116250. The attack must be carried out locally. There is no available exploit. You should upgrade the affected component.

Detailsinfo

A vulnerability was found in PostgreSQL pgAdmin up to 9.18 and classified as problematic. Affected by this issue is the function check_access_permission of the file servers.json of the component File Manager. The manipulation with an unknown input leads to a toctou vulnerability. Using CWE to declare the problem leads to CWE-367. The product checks the state of a resource before using that resource, but the resource's state can change between the check and the use in a way that invalidates the results of the check. This can cause the product to perform invalid actions when the resource is in an unexpected state. Impacted is confidentiality, integrity, and availability. CVE summarizes:

In server mode pgAdmin 4 validates a path a user gives for a file in their storage directory with check_access_permission() and then opened it by name. Several places opened it with a plain open() or handed the path to a utility that opened it later: the servers.json export and import and the import file listing, and the files given to pg_dump, pg_dumpall, pg_restore and psql by Backup, Restore and Import/Export Data. A symbolic link swapped in at the file or at any parent directory between the check and the open redirected the operation outside the storage directory, so a file could be written, overwritten or read, or loaded into a table, as the operating-system account running pgAdmin. A hard link to an outside file, which O_NOFOLLOW does not detect, and a FIFO, which could hang a request, had the same effect. CVE-2026-86861 fixed this for the File Manager's save_file; these were the remaining paths. Exploitation requires creating such a link or FIFO inside the user's storage directory. pgAdmin offers no way to do so, and the per-user storage directories belong to the pgAdmin account, so this requires write access to the storage backend as a different operating-system user, for example a shared or network-mounted storage directory, and winning the race. The fix opens each file by walking down from the storage directory one component at a time with O_NOFOLLOW, accepting only a regular file with one link, and passes the utilities the open descriptor (/dev/fd/N) on Linux. Error messages no longer include the server path. This issue affects pgAdmin 4: before 9.19.

The advisory is shared for download at github.com. This vulnerability is handled as CVE-2026-116250 since 10/25/2026. The exploitation is known to be easy. The attack needs to be approached locally. There are known technical details, but no exploit is available.

By approaching the search of inurl:servers.json it is possible to find vulnerable targets with Google Hacking.

Upgrading to version 9.19 eliminates this vulnerability.

VulDB is the best source for vulnerability data and more expert information about this specific topic.

Productinfo

Type

• Database Software

Vendor

• PostgreSQL

Name

• pgAdmin

Version

• 9.0
• 9.1
• 9.2
• 9.3
• 9.4
• 9.5
• 9.6
• 9.7
• 9.8
• 9.9
• 9.10
• 9.11
• 9.12
• 9.13
• 9.14
• 9.15
• 9.16
• 9.17
• 9.18

License

• open-source

CPE 2.3info

• 🔒
• 🔒
• 🔒

CPE 2.2info

• 🔒
• 🔒
• 🔒

CVSSv4info

CVSSv3info

CVSSv2info

Exploitinginfo

Threat Intelligenceinfo

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Entryinfo

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