Executive brief
Shirt Pocket SuperDuper!, a popular backup and disk cloning utility for macOS, contains a security flaw in its SDAgent component. If a user unlocks the application to allow backups to run without a password, a malicious program already on the computer could hijack this authorization to gain full 'root' control over the system. This could allow an attacker to bypass security protections, access all user data, or permanently compromise the operating system.
Technical details
A privilege escalation vulnerability exists in the SDAgent component of Shirt Pocket SuperDuper! v3.10 and earlier. The flaw stems from improper access control surrounding a setuid binary used to facilitate administrative tasks without repeated password prompts. When the application's 'lock' is toggled to an unlocked state, the component fails to properly validate that incoming commands are originating from the legitimate SuperDuper! application. A local malicious process can exploit this lack of validation to execute arbitrary commands with root privileges. The vendor has addressed this in version 3.11 by implementing signature and notarization validation for commands executed with escalated privileges.
Affected products
- Shirt Pocket SuperDuper! 3.10 and earlier
Timeline
- 2025-11-18: advisory: Vendor blog post detailing the vulnerability and release of v3.11
- 2025-12-01: disclosed: CVE published to NVD