Allowing the chrome.debugger API to run on file:// URLs in DevTools in Google Chrome prior to 69.0.3497.81 allowed an attacker who convince…

published 2019-01-09 7 y ago modified 2026-06-17 4 mo ago also EUVD-2018-7938

cvss: 7.4; version 3.0, NVD
cisa kev: Not listed; not in CISA's catalog
epss: 1.0%; EPSS 1.0% chance of exploitation in 30 days, percentile 64%
public exploits: 0; none known

Allowing the chrome.debugger API to run on file:// URLs in DevTools in Google Chrome prior to 69.0.3497.81 allowed an attacker who convinced a user to install a malicious extension to access files on the local file system without file access permission via a crafted Chrome Extension.

Patch / fix

fixed in 1 distros 3

Google Chrome 69.0.3497.81

ubuntu red hat opensuse

chromium-browser Ubuntu 16.04 LTS 69.0.3497.81-0ubuntu0.16.04.1
chromium-browser Ubuntu 18.04 LTS 69.0.3497.81-0ubuntu0.18.04.1

ubuntu advisories UBUNTU-CVE-2018-16081

Ubuntu security data © Canonical Ltd., from https://github.com/canonical/ubuntu-security-notices via OSV; changed: normalised to fixed package versions per release. CC BY-SA 4.0

chromium-browser RHEL 6 EXTRAS 69.0.3497.81-1.el6_10

red hat advisories RHSA-2018:2666

chromium openSUSE Tumbleweed 93.0.4577.82-1.1
chromium openSUSE Tumbleweed 113.0.5672.92-1.1

opensuse advisories openSUSE-SU-2024:10681-1 openSUSE-SU-2024:12948-1

Vendor advisories

What the vendors themselves say about their products: affected, fixed or not affected, and what to do.

red hat product security vex CVE-2018-16081 updated 2026-06-28 cvss 6.5

chromium-browser: Local file access in DevTools

Red Hat Enterprise Linux Desktop Supplementary (v. 6) chromium-browser 69.0.3497.81-1.el6_10 Red Hat Enterprise Linux Server Supplementary (v. 6) chromium-browser 69.0.3497.81-1.el6_10 Red Hat Enterprise Linux Workstation Supplementary (v. 6) chromium-browser 69.0.3497.81-1.el6_10
fixed: vendor fix RHSA-2018:2666

Red Hat CSAF VEX © Red Hat, Inc., from https://security.access.redhat.com/data/csaf/v2/vex/; changed: reduced to product statuses and remediations. CC BY 4.0 · csaf

Exploit prediction

1.04% chance of exploitation in the next 30 days, higher than 64% of all scored CVEs (FIRST EPSS, 2026-11-08).

CVSS scores

assigned by	version	score	vector
NVD	3.0	7.4	CVSS:3.0/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:R/S:C/C:H/I:N/A:N
NVD	2.0	4.3	AV:N/AC:M/Au:N/C:P/I:N/A:N

Affected products

Google Chrome

Classification

Weakness

CWE-862 Missing Authorization

Technology feeds

Google Chrome rss critical rss

References

access.redhat.com /errata/RHSA-2018:2666
vendor-advisory
security.gentoo.org /glsa/201811-10
vendor-advisory
crbug.com /666299
securityfocus.com /bid/105215
vdb-entry
chromereleases.googleblog.com /2018/09/stable-channel-update-for-desktop.html

Sources

CVE List CVE-2018-16081
NVD CVE-2018-16081

Fencer Vulns keeps one entry per vulnerability: the CVE id wins, then GHSA, and records that alias each other are merged, except that two CVEs always keep separate entries. The same data is available as JSON.

Summary