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Medium · 4.4 CVE-2026-48792 EUVD-2026-32647

pam_usb: pusb_has_virtual_input_device() silently discards EACCES, disabling remote desktop detection under non-root execution

Published May 27, 2026 · Updated May 28, 2026 · Assigned by GitHub_M

Description

pam_usb provides hardware authentication for Linux using ordinary removable media. Prior to 0.9.1, src/evdev.c silently ignores EACCES errors when opening /dev/input/event* nodes, causing pusb_has_virtual_input_device() to return 0 (no virtual devices found) even when every open() call failed due to insufficient permissions. The caller in src/local.c cannot distinguish a clean absence of virtual devices from a permission-denied scan, and acts on the false negative by continuing authentication without denying. This vulnerability is fixed in 0.9.1.

Affected products

VendorProductAffectedFixed
mcdope pam_usb < 0.9.1 —

References