GCVE Workshop - 22 September 2026 (14:00-18:00), Luxembourg Before The Vulnopticon Conference - Registration

BREW-OPENCLAW-CLI-CVE-20… (GHSA-9868-VXMX-W862)

Vulnerability from osv_homebrew – Published: 2026-08-13 17:21 – Updated: 2026-09-12 09:47 – Source website
VLAI
Summary
OpenClaw's system.run allowlist bypass via shell line-continuation command substitution
Details

Summary

In OpenClaw system.run allowlist mode, shell-wrapper analysis could be bypassed by splitting command substitution as $\\ + newline + ( inside double quotes. Analysis treated the payload as allowlisted (for example /bin/echo), while shell runtime folded the line continuation into $(...) and executed non-allowlisted subcommands.

Affected Packages / Versions

  • Package: npm openclaw
  • Latest published affected version: 2026.2.21-2
  • Affected range: <=2026.2.21-2
  • Patched version (planned next release): 2026.2.22

Impact

In deployments that opt into tools.exec.security=allowlist (with ask=on-miss or off), this can bypass approval boundaries and lead to unintended command execution.

Fix Commit(s)

  • 3f0b9dbb36c86e308267924c0d3d4a4e1fc4d1e9

Remediation

  • Upgrade to 2026.2.22 (or newer) when published.
  • Temporary mitigation: set tools.exec.ask=always or tools.exec.security=deny.

Release Process Note

patched_versions is pre-set to planned next release 2026.2.22. After npm release is out, this advisory should be ready for direct publish without additional metadata edits.

OpenClaw thanks @tdjackey for reporting.

References
To clipboard 

{
  "affected": [
    {
      "ecosystem_specific": {
        "fix": "bump",
        "range_state": "fixed",
        "upstream_fixed_in": "2026.2.22"
      },
      "package": {
        "ecosystem": "Homebrew",
        "name": "openclaw-cli",
        "purl": "pkg:brew/openclaw-cli"
      },
      "ranges": [
        {
          "events": [
            {
              "introduced": "0"
            },
            {
              "fixed": "2026.7.1"
            }
          ],
          "type": "ECOSYSTEM"
        }
      ]
    }
  ],
  "database_specific": {
    "confidence": "high",
    "source": "matched",
    "strategy": "registry",
    "upstream_evidence": [
      {
        "ecosystem": "npm",
        "key": "pkg:npm/openclaw@2026.9.4",
        "name": "openclaw",
        "strategy": "registry",
        "subject_version": "2026.9.4"
      }
    ]
  },
  "details": "### Summary\nIn OpenClaw `system.run` allowlist mode, shell-wrapper analysis could be bypassed by splitting command substitution as `$\\\\` + newline + `(` inside double quotes. Analysis treated the payload as allowlisted (for example `/bin/echo`), while shell runtime folded the line continuation into `$(...)` and executed non-allowlisted subcommands.\n\n### Affected Packages / Versions\n- Package: npm `openclaw`\n- Latest published affected version: `2026.2.21-2`\n- Affected range: `\u003c=2026.2.21-2`\n- Patched version (planned next release): `2026.2.22`\n\n### Impact\nIn deployments that opt into `tools.exec.security=allowlist` (with `ask=on-miss` or `off`), this can bypass approval boundaries and lead to unintended command execution.\n\n### Fix Commit(s)\n- `3f0b9dbb36c86e308267924c0d3d4a4e1fc4d1e9`\n\n### Remediation\n- Upgrade to `2026.2.22` (or newer) when published.\n- Temporary mitigation: set `tools.exec.ask=always` or `tools.exec.security=deny`.\n\n### Release Process Note\n`patched_versions` is pre-set to planned next release `2026.2.22`. After npm release is out, this advisory should be ready for direct publish without additional metadata edits.\n\nOpenClaw thanks @tdjackey for reporting.",
  "id": "BREW-openclaw-cli-CVE-2026-28460",
  "modified": "2026-09-12T09:47:35Z",
  "published": "2026-08-13T17:21:32Z",
  "references": [
    {
      "type": "WEB",
      "url": "https://github.com/openclaw/openclaw/security/advisories/GHSA-9868-vxmx-w862"
    },
    {
      "type": "ADVISORY",
      "url": "https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2026-28460"
    },
    {
      "type": "WEB",
      "url": "https://github.com/openclaw/openclaw/commit/3f0b9dbb36c86e308267924c0d3d4a4e1fc4d1e9"
    },
    {
      "type": "PACKAGE",
      "url": "https://github.com/openclaw/openclaw"
    },
    {
      "type": "WEB",
      "url": "https://www.vulncheck.com/advisories/openclaw-allowlist-bypass-via-shell-line-continuation-command-substitution-in-system-run"
    }
  ],
  "schema_version": "1.7.3",
  "summary": "OpenClaw\u0027s system.run allowlist bypass via shell line-continuation command substitution",
  "upstream": [
    "GHSA-9868-vxmx-w862",
    "CVE-2026-28460"
  ]
}



Log in or create an account to share your comment.




Tags
Taxonomy of the tags.





Forecast uses a logistic model when the trend is rising, or an exponential decay model when the trend is falling. Fitted via linearized least squares.

Sightings

Author Source Type Date Other

Nomenclature

  • Seen: The vulnerability was mentioned, discussed, or observed by the user.
  • Confirmed: The vulnerability has been validated from an analyst's perspective.
  • Published Proof of Concept: A public proof of concept is available for this vulnerability.
  • Exploited: The vulnerability was observed as exploited by the user who reported the sighting.
  • Patched: The vulnerability was observed as successfully patched by the user who reported the sighting.
  • Not exploited: The vulnerability was not observed as exploited by the user who reported the sighting.
  • Not confirmed: The user expressed doubt about the validity of the vulnerability.
  • Not patched: The vulnerability was not observed as successfully patched by the user who reported the sighting.


Detection rules are retrieved from Rulezet.


Related by attack behaviour

Vulnerabilities whose description is nearest to this one in the vector space of the CIRCL/vulnerability-attack-technique-biencoder model. This is a similarity search over the bi-encoder space (plain cosine), not a classification, and it has no measured accuracy.