shell argument leads to unnecessary privileges

Docs > Code Analysis > Static Analysis Rules > shell argument leads to unnecessary privileges

Metadata

ID: python-security/subprocess-shell-true

Language: Python

Severity: Warning

Category: Security

CWE: 78

Description

Never invoke subprocess.Popen with shell = True leads to unnecessary privileges and access to the underlying execution runtime. Execution with shell = True should clearly be verified and checked for code in production.

Learn More

CWE-250 - Execution with Unnecessary Privileges
CWE-657 - Violation of Secure Design Principles

Non-Compliant Code Examples

import subprocess

def find_dogweb_packages():
    # setuptools.find_packages is too slow since it walks the entire codebase, including Javascript code.
    # This is an equivalent but optimized function, specific to our codebase, listing all the available
    # packages.

    # Look for __init__.py files using fast UNIX tools
    r = subprocess.Popen(
        "find %s -name '__init__.py'" % " ".join(MODULE_PATHS), shell=True, stdout=subprocess.PIPE
    ).stdout.read()

from subprocess import Popen
Popen('/bin/ls %s' % ('something',), shell=True)

import subprocess
subprocess.Popen('/bin/ls %s' % ('something',), shell=True)

Compliant Code Examples

subprocess.Popen('/bin/ls %s' % ('something',), shell=False)