What is CVE-2018-21268?

CVE-2018-21268 is a critical-severity vulnerability in Traceroute Project, classified under Improper Neutralization of Special Elements in Output Used by a Downstream Component (Injection). CVSS score: 10.0/10. Published 2020-06-25.

How severe is CVE-2018-21268?

Critical severity. CVSS v3 base score is 10.0 out of 10.

Is CVE-2018-21268 known to be exploited?

1 public proof-of-concept repositories are indexed. Not currently listed in the CISA KEV catalog.

Vulnerability in Traceroute Project

CVE-2018-21268

The traceroute (aka node-traceroute) package through 1.0.0 for Node.js allows remote command injection via the host parameter. This occurs because the Child.exec() method, which is considered to be not entirely safe, is used. In particular, an OS command can be placed after a newline character.

Published 2020-06-25 · last modified 2026-06-17.

CVSS v3 metric

CVSS v3 base score 10.0 (Critical). Vector: CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:C/C:H/I:H/A:L.

EPSS exploit prediction

EPSS: 0.043 (90.8th percentile), scored 2026-09-29.

Low probability of exploitation in the next 30 days, but still tracked. 91st percentile — 90.8% of CVEs in the catalogue have a lower EPSS than this one. How to read EPSS.

EPSS over last 30 days · oldest: 0.043 · newest: 0.043 · change: 0.000

Affected products

Traceroute Project

Weakness classification (CWE)

CWE-74 — Improper Neutralization of Special Elements in Output Used by a Downstream Component (Injection)

Public proof-of-concept exploits

dannyEndorTest/node-vulnerable

References

www.linkedin.com/posts/op-innovate_shell-command-injection-through-traceroute-a… (Third Party Advisory)
www.op-c.net/2020/06/17/shell-command-injection-through-traceroute-npm-package/ (Exploit, Third Party Advisory)
medium.com/@shay_62828/shell-command-injection-through-traceroute-npm-package-a…
github.com/jaw187/node-traceroute/tags (Third Party Advisory)
www.npmjs.com/package/traceroute (Product, Third Party Advisory)
www.npmjs.com/advisories/1465 (Third Party Advisory)
snyk.io/vuln/npm:traceroute:20160311 (Exploit, Third Party Advisory)
github.com/jaw187/node-traceroute/commit/b99ee024a01a40d3d20a92ad3769cc78a3f638… (Patch, Third Party Advisory)

Frequently asked questions

What is CVE-2018-21268?: CVE-2018-21268 is a critical-severity vulnerability in Traceroute Project, classified under Improper Neutralization of Special Elements in Output Used by a Downstream Component (Injection). CVSS score: 10.0/10. Published 2020-06-25.
How severe is CVE-2018-21268?: Critical severity. CVSS v3 base score is 10.0 out of 10.
Is CVE-2018-21268 known to be exploited?: 1 public proof-of-concept repositories are indexed. Not currently listed in the CISA KEV catalog.