GNU cpio through 2.13 allows attackers to execute arbitrary code via a crafted pattern file, because of a dstring.c dsfgetstr integer overflow that triggers an out-of-bounds heap write. NOTE: it is unclear whether there are common cases where the pattern file, associated with the -E option, is untrusted data.

Debian's cpio contains a path traversal vulnerability. This issue was introduced by reverting CVE-2015-1197 patches which had caused a regression in --no-absolute-filenames. Upstream has since provided a proper fix to --no-absolute-filenames.