[ CVE-2026-118485 · Published 28 Oct 2026 ]
Vulnerability in Axel Download Accelerator Axel
[ Description ]Official description
Axel Download Accelerator 2.17.14 and earlier performs URL percent-decoding (http_decode()) on the output filename after the URL has been parsed and the filename component extracted. This allows an attacker to embed %2e%2e%2f (URL-encoded ../) sequences in the URL path. These sequences survive the URL parser intact (they contain no literal / characters) but are decoded into directory traversal sequences before the output file is opened for writing. As a result, a crafted URL can cause axel to write downloaded content to arbitrary filesystem paths relative to the current working directory.
[ Fixes ]Fixes and patches
No fix or interim patch is linked from our sources yet. Check the vendor references below and limit exposure of affected systems until a fix is available.