Friday, May 23, 2025
HomeSecurity NewsHackers Can Abuse Plugins for Popular Unix Text Editors to Escalate Privileges

Hackers Can Abuse Plugins for Popular Unix Text Editors to Escalate Privileges

Published on

SIEM as a Service

Follow Us on Google News

Advanced Unix Text Editors offers extensibility by allowing users to install third-party plugins for ease of use and to enhance the Text Editors functionalities.

Server administrators often run text editors with elevated privileges “sudo gedit” to edit root-owned configuration files. If the text editor contains vulnerable third-party plugin it enlarges attack surface.

A vulnerable third-party text editor plugin could be abused by attackers to escalate the privileges of your system/server.

- Advertisement - Google News

Also Read Top 5 Best Text Editors For Linux

According to recent safebreach research, “they found the inadequate separation of regular and elevated modes. Folder permissions integrity is not maintained and that opens the door for an attacker with regular user permissions to get the elevated execution of arbitrary code and to gain privilege escalation on the machine“.

Researchers tested the attacks the well known highly-ranked text editors Sublime, Vim, Emacs, Gedit, pico/nano. They have published a research paper with examples.

Here is the scenario “Imagine that an attacker can run the arbitrary code as a sudoer but not elevated, all he needs is to write the malicious plugin in user folder that uses the text editor and wait for the execution of plugin in elevated status”.

The vulnerability has been notified by researchers to vendors and it still remain’s unpatched. Researchers suggested monitoring modifications to the key files and folders presented by adding OSSEC rules.

Also Read Most Important Computer Forensics Tools for Hackers and Security Professionals

Below is the list of mitigations suggested – Unix Text Editors

  • Implement OSEC monitoring rules.
  • Deny write permissions for non-elevated users.
  • Change folders and file permission models to ensure separation between regular and elevated modes.
  • Prevent loading of 3rd party plugins when an editor is elevated.
  • Provide a manual interface to approve the elevated loading of plugins.
Gurubaran
Gurubaran
Gurubaran is a co-founder of Cyber Security News and GBHackers On Security. He has 10+ years of experience as a Security Consultant, Editor, and Analyst in cybersecurity, technology, and communications.

Latest articles

Winos 4.0 Malware Masquerades as VPN and QQBrowser to Target Users

A sophisticated malware campaign deploying Winos 4.0, a memory-resident stager, has been uncovered by...

NETGEAR Router Flaw Allows Full Admin Access by Attackers

A severe authentication bypass vulnerability (CVE-2025-4978) has been uncovered in NETGEAR’s DGND3700v2 wireless routers,...

Operation Endgame Crushes DanaBot Malware, Shuts Down 150 C2 Servers and Halts 1,000 Daily Attacks

Operation Endgame II has delivered a devastating strike against DanaBot, a notorious malware that...

Apple XNU Kernel Flaw Enables Attackers to Escalate Privileges

Apple has released urgent security patches addressing CVE-2025-31219, a high-severity vulnerability in its XNU...

Resilience at Scale

Why Application Security is Non-Negotiable

The resilience of your digital infrastructure directly impacts your ability to scale. And yet, application security remains a critical weak link for most organizations.

Application Security is no longer just a defensive play—it’s the cornerstone of cyber resilience and sustainable growth. In this webinar, Karthik Krishnamoorthy (CTO of Indusface) and Phani Deepak Akella (VP of Marketing – Indusface), will share how AI-powered application security can help organizations build resilience by

Discussion points


Protecting at internet scale using AI and behavioral-based DDoS & bot mitigation.
Autonomously discovering external assets and remediating vulnerabilities within 72 hours, enabling secure, confident scaling.
Ensuring 100% application availability through platforms architected for failure resilience.
Eliminating silos with real-time correlation between attack surface and active threats for rapid, accurate mitigation

More like this

Phishing Campaign Uses Blob URLs to Bypass Email Security and Avoid Detection

Cybersecurity researchers at Cofense Intelligence have identified a sophisticated phishing tactic leveraging Blob URIs...

UK Government to Shift Away from Passwords in New Security Move

UK government has unveiled plans to implement passkey technology across its digital services later...

New Spam Campaign Leverages Remote Monitoring Tools to Exploit Organizations

A sophisticated spam campaign targeting Portuguese-speaking users in Brazil has been uncovered by Cisco...