Path Traversal in Dronecode Px4 Drone Autopilot

CVE-2026-32709

PX4 autopilot is a flight control solution for drones. Prior to 1.17.0-rc2, An unauthenticated path traversal vulnerability in the PX4 Autopilot MAVLink FTP implementation allows any MAVLink peer to read, write, create, delete, and rename arbitrary files on the flight controller filesystem without authentication. On NuttX targets, the FTP root directory is an empty string, meaning attacker-supplied paths are passed directly to filesystem syscalls with no prefix or sanitization for read operations. On POSIX targets (Linux companion computers, SITL), the write-path validation function unconditionally returns true, providing no protection. A TOCTOU race condition in the write validation on NuttX further allows bypassing the only existing guard. This vulnerability is fixed in 1.17.0-rc2.

Vulnerability class: Path Traversal (Directory Traversal)

EPSS: 0.005 (38.5th percentile) — read the EPSS interpretation.

CVSS v3 metric

CVSS v3 base score 5.4 (Medium). Vector: CVSS:3.1/AV:A/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:L/I:L/A:N.

Affected products

Weakness classification (CWE)

References

Frequently asked questions

What is CVE-2026-32709?
CVE-2026-32709 is a medium-severity vulnerability in Dronecode Px4 Drone Autopilot, classified under Path Traversal. CVSS score: 5.4/10. Published 2026-03-16.
How severe is CVE-2026-32709?
Medium severity. CVSS v3 base score is 5.4 out of 10.