OpenClaw has a workspace-only sandbox guard mismatch for @-prefixed absolute paths

A workspace-only file-system guard mismatch allowed @-prefixed absolute paths to bypass boundary validation in some tool path checks.

Impact

When tools.fs.workspaceOnly=true, certain @-prefixed absolute paths (for example @/etc/passwd) could be validated before canonicalization while runtime path handling normalized the prefix differently. In affected code paths this could permit reads outside the intended workspace boundary.

Per SECURITY.md, OpenClaw is primarily a personal-assistant runtime with trusted-user assumptions, and this path is gated behind non-default sandbox/tooling configuration. That reduces practical exposure, but the bypass is still a security bug and is fixed.

Affected Packages / Versions

• Package: openclaw (npm)
• Latest published at triage time: 2026.2.23
• Affected versions: <= 2026.2.23
• Patched versions: >= 2026.2.24

Fix Commit(s)

• 9ef0fc2ff8fa7b145d1e746d6eb030b1bf692260

OpenClaw thanks @tdjackey for reporting.