What is CVE-2018-8885?

CVE-2018-8885 is a high-severity vulnerability in Canonical Screen-Resolution-Extra, classified under Concurrent Execution using Shared Resource with Improper Synchronization (Race Condition). CVSS score: 7.0/10. Published 2018-03-28.

How severe is CVE-2018-8885?

High severity. CVSS v3 base score is 7.0 out of 10.

Vulnerability in Canonical Screen-Resolution-Extra

CVE-2018-8885

screenresolution-mechanism in screen-resolution-extra 0.17.2 does not properly use the PolicyKit D-Bus API, which allows local users to bypass intended access restrictions by leveraging a race condition via a setuid or pkexec process that is mishandled in a PolicyKitService._check_permission call.

Vulnerability class: Race Condition

Published 2018-03-28 · last modified 2026-06-17.

CVSS v3 metric

CVSS v3 base score 7.0 (High). Vector: CVSS:3.0/AV:L/AC:H/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:H.

EPSS exploit prediction

EPSS: 0.002 (10.8th percentile), scored 2026-10-02.

Very low probability of exploitation in the next 30 days; routine patching cadence is appropriate. 11th percentile — 10.8% of CVEs in the catalogue have a lower EPSS than this one. How to read EPSS.

EPSS over last 30 days · oldest: 0.002 · newest: 0.002 · change: -0.000

Affected products

Canonical Screen-Resolution-Extra — versions 0.17.2
Canonical Ubuntu Linux — versions 14.04, 16.04, 17.10

Weakness classification (CWE)

CWE-362 — Concurrent Execution using Shared Resource with Improper Synchronization (Race Condition)

References

usn.ubuntu.com/3607-1/ (vendor-advisory, Vendor Advisory)

Frequently asked questions

What is CVE-2018-8885?: CVE-2018-8885 is a high-severity vulnerability in Canonical Screen-Resolution-Extra, classified under Concurrent Execution using Shared Resource with Improper Synchronization (Race Condition). CVSS score: 7.0/10. Published 2018-03-28.
How severe is CVE-2018-8885?: High severity. CVSS v3 base score is 7.0 out of 10.