What is CVE-2020-15708?

CVE-2020-15708 is a critical-severity vulnerability in Canonical Ubuntu Linux, classified under Incorrect Permission Assignment for Critical Resource. CVSS score: 9.3/10. Published 2020-11-06.

How severe is CVE-2020-15708?

Critical severity. CVSS v3 base score is 9.3 out of 10.

Vulnerability in Canonical Ubuntu Linux

CVE-2020-15708

Ubuntu's packaging of libvirt in 20.04 LTS created a control socket with world read and write permissions. An attacker could use this to overwrite arbitrary files or execute arbitrary code.

Published 2020-11-06 · last modified 2026-06-17.

CVSS v3 metric

CVSS v3 base score 9.3 (Critical). Vector: CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:C/C:H/I:H/A:H.

EPSS exploit prediction

EPSS: 0.004 (31.6th percentile), scored 2026-09-28.

Very low probability of exploitation in the next 30 days; routine patching cadence is appropriate. 32nd percentile — 31.6% of CVEs in the catalogue have a lower EPSS than this one. How to read EPSS.

EPSS over last 30 days · oldest: 0.004 · newest: 0.004 · change: 0.000

Affected products

Canonical Ubuntu Linux — versions 20.04
Ubuntu Libvirt — versions unspecified

Weakness classification (CWE)

CWE-732 — Incorrect Permission Assignment for Critical Resource

References

usn.ubuntu.com/usn/usn-4452-1 (Vendor Advisory)

Frequently asked questions

What is CVE-2020-15708?: CVE-2020-15708 is a critical-severity vulnerability in Canonical Ubuntu Linux, classified under Incorrect Permission Assignment for Critical Resource. CVSS score: 9.3/10. Published 2020-11-06.
How severe is CVE-2020-15708?: Critical severity. CVSS v3 base score is 9.3 out of 10.