In systemd 240, bus_open_system_watch_bind_with_description in shared/bus-util.c (as used by systemd-resolved to connect to the system D-Bus instance), calls sd_bus_set_trusted, which disables access controls for incoming D-Bus messages. An unprivileged user can exploit this by executing D-Bus methods that should be restricted to privileged users, in order to change the system's DNS resolver settings.

An issue was discovered in sd-bus in systemd 239. bus_process_object() in libsystemd/sd-bus/bus-objects.c allocates a variable-length stack buffer for temporarily storing the object path of incoming D-Bus messages. An unprivileged local user can exploit this by sending a specially crafted message to PID1, causing the stack pointer to jump over the stack guard pages into an unmapped memory region and trigger a denial of service (systemd PID1 crash and kernel panic).

The session_link_x11_socket function in login/logind-session.c in systemd-logind in systemd, possibly 37 and earlier, allows local users to create or overwrite arbitrary files via a symlink attack on the X11 user directory in /run/user/.