CVE-2025-61984: 
Rocky Linux vulnerability analysis and mitigation

CVE-2025-61984 affects OpenSSH versions before 10.1, discovered in October 2025. The vulnerability allows control characters in usernames that originate from certain possibly untrusted sources, potentially leading to code execution when a ProxyCommand is used. The untrusted sources include the command line and %-sequence expansion of a configuration file (NVD, OpenSSH Release Notes).

The vulnerability stems from insufficient input validation where control characters in usernames were not properly filtered when passed via the commandline or expanded using %-sequences from the configuration file. This could allow an attacker to inject shell expressions that may be executed when the proxy command is started. The vulnerability has a CVSS v3.1 Base Score of 3.6 (Low) with vector: CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:H/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:L/I:L/A:N (NVD, Security Blog).

The vulnerability can result in Remote Code Execution (RCE) under specific conditions. However, the impact is considered moderate as it requires particular configurations and depends on the user having specific ProxyCommand settings that use the %r expansion token. The main attack vector is through git submodules, where a malicious username configured in the main module's .gitmodules file could trigger the vulnerability (Security Blog).

The vulnerability is exploitable when a user has a particular SSH configuration using ProxyCommand with %r argument and clones a malicious git repository with submodules. The exploit works by forcing a syntax error in the shell command execution, which can lead to arbitrary code execution. Different shells (bash, fish, csh/tcsh) are affected differently, while zsh appears to be resistant to the exploit (Security Blog).

The primary mitigation is to upgrade to OpenSSH version 10.1 or later, which disallows control characters in usernames. Alternative mitigations include changing any ProxyCommand in SSH client configuration that passes the %r expansion token to quote it with single quotes. For git users, it's recommended to configure git to turn off SSH transports for submodules using 'git config --global protocol.ssh.allow user'. Additionally, disabling URL handlers for ssh:// can provide additional protection (Security Blog, OpenSSH Release Notes).

The vulnerability was discovered and reported by David Leadbeater, with acknowledgments from the OpenSSH team. The OpenSSH developers considered this a minor security issue, as reflected in their release notes and the low CVSS score. The fix was quickly implemented and released as part of OpenSSH 10.1 (OpenSSH Release Notes, OSS Security).