CVE-2018-7484
As the residing directory of PureVPNService.exe is writable to all users, this makes the application susceptible to privilege escalation through DLL hijacking.
Does this matter?
High impact if exploited, but EPSS currently rates exploitation as unlikely (2.60%). Schedule it in the normal patch cycle and watch for a rise in EPSS or a public exploit.
Description
An issue was discovered in PureVPN through 5.19.4.0 on Windows. The client installation grants the Everyone group Full Control permission to the installation directory. In addition, the PureVPNService.exe service, which runs under NT Authority\SYSTEM privileges, tries to load several dynamic-link libraries using relative paths instead of the absolute path. When not using a fully qualified path, the application will first try to load the library from the directory from which the application is started. As the residing directory of PureVPNService.exe is writable to all users, this makes the application susceptible to privilege escalation through DLL hijacking.
- CVSS 3.0
- 7.8 HIGHCVSS:3.0/AV:L/AC:L/PR:N/UI:R/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:H
- EPSS
- 2.60% probability · 85th percentile
- Public exploits
- None in Exploit-DB
- CISA KEV
- Not listed
- Weakness
- CWE-426
- Affected
- purevpn/purevpn
- Source
- cve@mitre.org
EPSS moved from 4.3% on 21 September 2026 to 2.6% on 27 October 2026.
References
- http://www.defensecode.com/advisories/DC-2018-02-001-PureVPN-Windows-Privilege-Escalation.pdfThird Party Advisory
- https://www.securityfocus.com/archive/1/541803Third Party Advisory, VDB Entry
- http://www.defensecode.com/advisories/DC-2018-02-001-PureVPN-Windows-Privilege-Escalation.pdfThird Party Advisory
- https://www.securityfocus.com/archive/1/541803Third Party Advisory, VDB Entry
Source: NVD record, EPSS from FIRST.org, KEV from CISA, exploits from Exploit-DB. Refreshed daily. Download this record as JSON.