depers-rus/cve-2007-4559Proof-of-concept demonstrating CVE-2007-4559 path traversal in Python's tarfile module, allowing arbitrary file overwrite via malicious TAR archives.
A malicious TAR archive can include file paths like ../../../../etc/passwd, which try to "climb up" out of the intended extraction folder.
If a Python script uses tarfile.extract() or extractall() without checking the file paths, it will unpack files to those locations — even if they point outside the target directory.
That means a hacker could overwrite sensitive or system files, especially if the user runs the script with elevated permissions.
As of 2025, both Debian 11–12 and Ubuntu 24 are still affected by this vulnerability. Other operating systems haven’t been tested, but these two are among the most widely used, so that alone is concerning. Even though this vulnerability dates back to 2007, it’s still present in LTS (long-term support) versions — and the vulnerable software isn’t patched automatically through a standard apt upgrade.
