rm: 'rm -rf ./' (and ./// variants) silently deletes current directory contents, bypassing dot protection
`rm -rf .` is correctly refused, but `clean_trailing_slashes` normalizes `.///` to `./` while `path_is_current_or_parent_directory` only matches `.`/`..` (and `/.`/`/..`), not `./` or `../`. So `rm -rf ./` recursively deletes the directory's contents and then prints a misleading `cannot remove './': Invalid input`. **Impact:** all files/subdirectories in the current directory are silently deleted; the misleading error makes users miss the recovery window. Recommendation: handle trailing-slash variants in `path_is_current_or_parent_directory`. **Remediation:** Acknowledged by Canonical; fixed in commit d0e5af23. --- _Reported by Zellic in the *uutils coreutils Program Security Assessment* (prepared for Canonical, Jan 20 2026), audited commit `3a07ffc5a9bd4c283e75afa548ba1f1957bad242`. Finding 3.60. Credit: Zellic._ _Upstream tracking issue: https://github.com/uutils/coreutils/issues/9749 · CVE-2026-35363_
describes (1)
Related CVEs.
| ID | severity | exploitable | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| CVE-2026-35363US | — | — | ||
A vulnerability in the rm utility of uutils coreutils allows the bypass of safeguard mechanisms intended to protect the current directory. While the utility correctly refuses to de… | ||||
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