CVE intelligence and bounded remediation

CVE-2020-1740 — A flaw was found in Ansible Engine when using Ansible Vault for editing encrypted files

Medium CVSS 4.7

A flaw was found in Ansible Engine when using Ansible Vault for editing encrypted files. When a user executes "ansible-vault edit", another user on the same computer can read the old and new secret, as it is created in a temporary file with mkstemp and the returned file descriptor is closed and the method write_data is called to write the existing secret in the file. This method will delete the file before recreating it insecurely. All versions in 2.7.x, 2.8.x and 2.9.x branches are believed to be vulnerable.

Severity
Medium
CVSS
4.7 (3.1)
Published
2020-03-16
CISA KEV
Not currently listed
Ecosystem
software/application
Weaknesses
CWE-377, CWE-200

Affected products

  • redhat / ansible
  • redhat / ansible_tower
  • redhat / cloudforms_management_engine / 5.0
  • redhat / openstack / 13
  • debian / debian_linux / 8.0
  • debian / debian_linux / 10.0

Showing 6 representative product identities from 14 source matches. Confirm exact affected versions with the linked vendor and NVD evidence.

Matched remediation archetype

Path traversal, unsafe upload, and file handling

This catalog composition supplies bounded fallback guidance. Explicitly reviewed curated workflows load with the complete record below.

Check exposure

  • Trace untrusted filenames, archive entries, URLs, and path segments into read, write, include, extraction, and upload operations.
  • Identify filesystem roots, mount permissions, symbolic-link behavior, archive handling, and whether uploaded content is web-accessible or executable.
  • Review canonicalization and containment checks across supported operating systems and storage backends.

Remediate safely

  • Generate server-side storage identifiers and resolve paths beneath a fixed root using filesystem-aware containment checks.
  • Reject absolute, parent-relative, alternate-separator, device, link, and archive entries that escape the intended root.
  • Store uploads outside executable or served paths, validate type and size, and use private atomic temporary files.

Authoritative sources

Complete CVE record and remediation plan

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