Severity by source
AV:N/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:H/A:L
Network-accessible API requiring only low-privilege authenticated access with NOTEBOOK_EDIT; integrity is high due to ACL/metadata overwrite, availability low, no confidentiality impact.
Primary rating from Vendor (rapid7).
CVSS VectorVendor: rapid7
Lifecycle Timeline
3DescriptionCVE.org
The NewNotebook API does not sufficiently sanitize its parameters allowing an authenticated user with NOTEBOOK_EDIT permission to write the notebook record outside the org's data store directory. The file written must have an extension of ".json.db" but can otherwise overwrite other metadata files (such as ACL records, hunts etc). This can corrupt these files and cause data corruption.
AnalysisAI
Path traversal in Velociraptor's NewNotebook API allows authenticated users holding NOTEBOOK_EDIT permission to write files outside the organization's designated data store directory. While the written file is constrained to the '.json.db' extension, this is sufficient to overwrite critical internal metadata files - including ACL records and hunt configurations - causing data corruption that can undermine the integrity of active forensic investigations. No public exploit code or CISA KEV listing has been identified at time of analysis; exploitation requires a valid authenticated session with a specific permission grant.
Technical ContextAI
Velociraptor is an open-source DFIR (Digital Forensics and Incident Response) platform developed by Rapid7, used by security teams for endpoint visibility, threat hunting, and forensic data collection. The vulnerability resides in the NewNotebook API, which creates notebook records for collaborative analysis. The root cause is CWE-22 (Improper Limitation of a Pathname to a Restricted Directory - 'Path Traversal'): the API fails to canonicalize or validate the supplied notebook path parameter before constructing the on-disk write path, allowing an attacker to inject directory traversal sequences (e.g., '../../') to escape the org-scoped data store directory. The file extension is constrained to '.json.db', which is the format used by Velociraptor for internal metadata storage - making this constraint itself the attack surface rather than a meaningful defense. Affected CPE: cpe:2.3:a:rapid7:velociraptor:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*.
RemediationAI
Consult the Rapid7 vendor advisory at http://docs.velociraptor.app/announcements/advisories/cve-2026-18640/ for the specific patched Velociraptor version; a precise fix version is not independently confirmed from available data so the advisory is the authoritative source. As an immediate compensating control, audit and restrict NOTEBOOK_EDIT permissions to only fully trusted administrative accounts, since this is the sole prerequisite for exploitation - revoking it from analyst-tier or lower-trust accounts eliminates the attack surface entirely with no functional loss for those users. Additionally, consider monitoring the Velociraptor data store directory for unexpected '.json.db' files written outside designated org subdirectories as a detection measure.
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Same weakness CWE-22 – Path Traversal
View allSame technique Path Traversal
View allShare
External POC / Exploit Code
Leaving vuln.today
EUVD-2026-56184
GHSA-48j3-8whw-hq63