Markdown Preview Enhanced: One Click RCE via Markdown Link Command Injection on Windows
Markdown Preview Enhanced is a Markdown preview extension for Visual Studio Code. Prior to 0.8.28, Markdown Preview Enhanced preview-link handling passes a decoded, Markdown-controlled link target to a Windows file-opening helper that invokes child_process.exec with the start command. When a Windows user opens an untrusted Markdown file and clicks a crafted external or unsupported-scheme link, shell metacharacters in the decoded target are interpreted by cmd.exe as command separators, allowing an attacker-selected command to run with the privileges of the current VS Code user. The attack requires one normal preview-link click but does not require malicious workspace configuration, script execution to be enabled, or additional files. This issue is fixed in version 0.8.28.
- Products
- Not specified
- Affected versions
- Not specified
- Fixed versions
- Not specified
- CVEs
- CVE-2026-54525
- Confirmed fixed CVEs
- Not specified
- Updated in this feed
- 3 Nov 2026, 11:20 UTC · Revision 1
Source evidence
Markdown Preview Enhanced: One Click RCE via Markdown Link Command Injection on Windows
core-osv · Original sourcePublished 14 Oct 2026, 19:06 UTC
Markdown Preview Enhanced is a Markdown preview extension for Visual Studio Code. Prior to 0.8.28, Markdown Preview Enhanced preview-link handling passes a decoded, Markdown-controlled link target to a Windows file-opening helper that invokes child_process.exec with the start command. When a Windows user opens an untrusted Markdown file and clicks a crafted external or unsupported-scheme link, shell metacharacters in the decoded target are interpreted by cmd.exe as command separators, allowing an attacker-selected command to run with the privileges of the current VS Code user. The attack requires one normal preview-link click but does not require malicious workspace configuration, script execution to be enabled, or additional files. This issue is fixed in version 0.8.28.
osv:CVE-2026-54525
Complete source record
{
"id": "c42827e48eab49337389ca844dad02ee65af4ff502749d64f103fa520a669aa9",
"url": "https://osv.dev/vulnerability/CVE-2026-54525",
"method": "structured",
"payload": {
"kind": "advisory",
"title": "Markdown Preview Enhanced: One Click RCE via Markdown Link Command Injection on Windows",
"summary": "Markdown Preview Enhanced is a Markdown preview extension for Visual Studio Code. Prior to 0.8.28, Markdown Preview Enhanced preview-link handling passes a decoded, Markdown-controlled link target to a Windows file-opening helper that invokes child_process.exec with the start command. When a Windows user opens an untrusted Markdown file and clicks a crafted external or unsupported-scheme link, shell metacharacters in the decoded target are interpreted by cmd.exe as command separators, allowing an attacker-selected command to run with the privileges of the current VS Code user. The attack requires one normal preview-link click but does not require malicious workspace configuration, script execution to be enabled, or additional files. This issue is fixed in version 0.8.28.",
"evidence": "osv:CVE-2026-54525",
"products": [],
"severity": "high",
"structured": {
"id": "CVE-2026-54525",
"aliases": [
"CVE-2026-54525",
"GHSA-7v6f-3vq6-r373"
],
"metrics": [
{
"type": "CVSS_V3",
"score": "CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:R/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:H"
}
],
"affected": [
{
"ranges": [
{
"repo": "https://github.com/shd101wyy/crossnote",
"type": "GIT",
"events": [
{
"introduced": "0"
},
{
"fixed": "5588ca2121c3da43fe331575dc5cf4ef347b91ee"
}
],
"database_specific": {
"extracted_events": [
{
"range": [
{
"fixed": "5588ca2121c3da43fe331575dc5cf4ef347b91ee"
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"source": "REFERENCES_COMMIT"
},
{
"range": [
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],
"source": "REFERENCES_TAG",
"original_tag": "0.9.29"
}
]
}
},
{
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"type": "GIT",
"events": [
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{
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}
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"database_specific": {
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"source": "AFFECTED_FIELD",
"strategy": "StringRangeExpression"
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{
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}
],
"source": "REFERENCES_COMMIT"
},
{
"range": [
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"source": "REFERENCES_TAG",
"original_tag": "0.8.28"
},
{
"range": [
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{
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"source": "DESCRIPTION"
}
]
}
}
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"database_specific": {
"source": "https://storage.googleapis.com/cve-osv-conversion/osv-output/CVE-2026-54525.json"
}
}
],
"modified": "2026-10-28T02:30:28.111640468Z",
"provider": "osv",
"references": [
"https://github.com/shd101wyy/crossnote/releases/tag/0.9.29",
"https://github.com/shd101wyy/vscode-markdown-preview-enhanced/releases/tag/0.8.28",
"https://github.com/CVEProject/cvelistV5/tree/main/cves/2026/54xxx/CVE-2026-54525.json",
"https://github.com/shd101wyy/vscode-markdown-preview-enhanced/security/advisories/GHSA-7v6f-3vq6-r373",
"https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2026-54525",
"https://github.com/shd101wyy/crossnote/commit/5588ca2121c3da43fe331575dc5cf4ef347b91ee",
"https://github.com/shd101wyy/crossnote/pull/442",
"https://github.com/shd101wyy/vscode-markdown-preview-enhanced/commit/dcd80281c986293b93d9f1af34ced64dcb230c77",
"https://github.com/shd101wyy/vscode-markdown-preview-enhanced/pull/2318"
],
"provider_metadata": {
"cwe_ids": [
"CWE-78"
],
"cna_assigner": "GitHub_M",
"osv_generated_from": "https://github.com/CVEProject/cvelistV5/tree/main/cves/2026/54xxx/CVE-2026-54525.json"
}
},
"related_cves": [
{
"value": "CVE-2026-54525",
"evidence": "/id"
}
],
"security_relevant": true,
"severity_evidence": "/severity/0/score"
},
"source_id": "core-osv",
"document_id": 494906,
"published_at": "2026-10-14T19:06:59.44+00:00"
}