Riskcovery

CVE-2026-20040

Cisco IOS XR Software CLI Privilege Escalation Vulnerability

State
Published
Severity
8.8 High
Published
Mar 11, 2026
Updated
Mar 12, 2026
Reserved
Oct 8, 2025

Read the record on cve.org

Description

A vulnerability in the CLI of Cisco IOS XR Software could allow an authenticated, local attacker to execute arbitrary commands as root on the underlying operating system of an affected device.

This vulnerability is due to insufficient validation of user arguments that are passed to specific CLI commands. An attacker with a low-privileged account could exploit this vulnerability by using crafted commands at the prompt. A successful exploit could allow the attacker to elevate privileges to root and execute arbitrary commands on the underlying operating system.

Scores

CVSSScoreVectorSource
3.18.8 HighCVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:C/C:H/I:H/A:Hcisco

Weaknesses

  • CWE-78 Improper Neutralization of Special Elements used in an OS Command ('OS Command Injection')

Affected Products

ProductVersions
Cisco IOS XR SoftwareCisco
  • 6.5.3Affected
  • 6.5.29Affected
  • 6.5.1Affected
  • 6.6.1Affected
  • 6.5.2Affected
  • 6.5.92Affected
  • 6.5.15Affected
  • 6.6.2Affected
  • 7.0.1Affected
  • 6.6.25Affected
  • 6.5.26Affected
  • 6.6.11Affected
  • 6.5.25Affected
  • 6.5.28Affected
  • 6.5.93Affected
  • 6.6.12Affected
  • 6.5.90Affected
  • 7.1.1Affected
  • 7.0.90Affected
  • 6.6.3Affected
  • 6.7.1Affected
  • 7.0.2Affected
  • 7.1.15Affected
  • 7.2.1Affected
  • 7.1.2Affected
  • and 91 more versions

References

Every record here comes from the CVE Program’s CVE List. © 1999–2026 The MITRE Corporation. CVE is a registered trademark of The MITRE Corporation. The records are reproduced under the CVE Program terms of use.