Trending
CVE-2018-10169

CVE detail

CVE-2018-10169

ProtonVPN 1.3.3 for Windows suffers from a SYSTEM privilege escalation vulnerability through the "ProtonVPN Service" service. This service establishes an NetNamedPipe endpoint that allows arbitrary installed applications to connect and call publicly exposed methods. The "Connect" method accepts a class instance argument that provides attacker control of the OpenVPN command line. An attacker can specify a dynamic library plugin that should run for every new VPN connection. This plugin will execute code in the context of the SYSTEM user.

CVSS 9.8 · CriticalBuzz score 21.0

Buzz score

Why this CVE is surfacing

Buzz score total 21.0

This all-time snapshot uses the same composite formula as Trending across a 30-year evidence window, rather than a current rolling window.

Buzz score components · mention 11.0 · diversity 10.0 · KEV 0.0 · OTX 0.0 · PoC 0.0

Mention score

11.0

2 evidence mentions in the snapshot

Diversity score

10.0

2 sources across 2 categories

KEV score

0.0

No KEV entry observed

OTX score

0.0

0 OTX pulses

PoC score

0.0

0 repos · best confidence N/A

Best PoC traction

Maximum stars on a matched PoC repo

Why it matters now

Mention timeline

Total mentions: 0; within the 30d window
Peak daily: 0; highest bucket

Evidence

Source links by recency

Newest mentions first

2 source links · newest first

Personal VPN and Its Evasions: Risk Factors and How to Maintain Network VisibilityUnit42
Personal VPN usage on organizations’ networks can obscure network visibility and open the door to cybercrime such as data exfiltration.
vendorunit42.paloaltonetworks.comAug 17, 2021, 1:00 AM
VPN Firms Release New Patches for Privilege Escalation FlawSecurityWeek
Virtual private network (VPN) service providers ProtonVPN and NordVPN have made another attempt to patch a potentially serious privilege escalation vulnerability that they first tried to address a few months ago.
newswww.securityweek.comSep 10, 2018, 3:02 PM

Exploit code

Public exploit repository references

Public PoC repositories are third-party, potentially unsafe artifacts. Treat their code as untrusted and use it only on authorized systems in an isolated, least-privilege environment. cvebuzz does not execute the code or verify that an exploit works.

0 repository references · best confidence N/A · max 0 stars

No public PoC repositories have been matched yet.

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External lookup

Potential internet exposure

Potential exposure only — not proof of vulnerability.Shodan results indicate potentially internet-exposed products, not confirmed vulnerable systems. They do not confirm that any returned system is vulnerable to CVE-2018-10169.

Product-level CPE searches intentionally omit version fields and NVD version-range or configuration certainty. Verify the exact product version and configuration independently.

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Product CPE queries

Derived from this CVE's existing NVD CPE 2.3 records; the application, operating-system, or hardware part is retained.

cpe:2.3:a:protonmail:protonvpnSearch this product on Shodan

Exact CVE query

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vuln:CVE-2018-10169Search this CVE on Shodan

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Metadata

Canonical fields

NVD status

Unavailable

Published

Apr 16, 2018

Modified

Jun 17, 2026

Official record

Authoritative NVD record

CVSS vector

CVSS:3.0/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:H

CWE IDs

Vendor classifications

How this vector reads

CVSS 3.0 base metrics decoded below. This explanation does not recalculate or change the NVD score.

Attack Vector (AV): Network. The vulnerable system can be reached across network boundaries.
Attack Complexity (AC): Low. No special conditions beyond the attacker-controlled steps are required.
Privileges Required (PR): None. The attacker needs no privileges on the vulnerable system.
User Interaction (UI): None. Exploitation does not require another user to act.
Scope (S): Unchanged. Impacts remain within the vulnerable security authority.
Confidentiality Impact (C): High. There is a total or serious impact to this security property.
Integrity Impact (I): High. There is a total or serious impact to this security property.
Availability Impact (A): High. There is a total or serious impact to this security property.

Signals

Exploitation indicators

0 stored signals · no KEV · 0 OTX pulses