CVE-2025-48384

A line-end handling flaw was found in Git. When writing a config entry, values with a trailing carriage return (CR) are not quoted, resulting in the CR being lost when the config is read later. When initializing a submodule, if the submodule path contains a trailing CR, the altered path is read, resulting in the submodule being checked out to an incorrect location.

This vulnerability marked as Important and not Moderate flaw because it undermines Git’s path and config integrity by allowing carriage return (\r) injection to manipulate submodule checkout behavior. Git previously failed to quote config values containing trailing CR, causing the value to be misinterpreted when read back. In the context of submodules, this leads to incorrect path resolution, allowing an attacker to redirect the checkout path via a symlink to a sensitive directory like .git/modules/<submodule>/hooks. If an executable post-checkout hook exists there, it could be inadvertently executed, resulting in arbitrary code execution during submodule operations. This is particularly dangerous in automated CI/CD pipelines or multi-repo projects where submodules are initialized or updated without manual inspection.

The CVSS score(s) listed for this vulnerability do not reflect the associated product's status, and are included for informational purposes to better understand the severity of this vulnerability.

To mitigate this issue, avoid using --recurse-submodules when cloning repositories from untrusted sources; instead, clone normally and only initialize or update submodules manually after reviewing them.