A vulnerability in the NETCONF feature of Cisco IOS XE Software could allow an authenticated, remote attacker to elevate privileges to root…

published 2024-03-27 2 y ago modified 2026-06-17 4 mo ago also EUVD-2024-17993

cvss: 6.5; version 3.1, CNA
cisa kev: Not listed; not in CISA's catalog
epss: 0.5%; EPSS 0.5% chance of exploitation in 30 days, percentile 46%
public exploits: 0; none known

A vulnerability in the NETCONF feature of Cisco IOS XE Software could allow an authenticated, remote attacker to elevate privileges to root on an affected device. This vulnerability is due to improper validation of user-supplied input. An attacker could exploit this vulnerability by sending crafted input over NETCONF to an affected device. A successful exploit could allow the attacker to elevate privileges from Administrator to root.

CISA SSVC

Exploitation: none
Automatable: no
Technical impact: total
Assessed: 2 y ago (2024-03-28)

Exploit prediction

0.55% chance of exploitation in the next 30 days, higher than 46% of all scored CVEs (FIRST EPSS, 2026-11-08).

CVSS scores

assigned by	version	score	vector
CNA	3.1	6.5	CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:H/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:N

Affected products

Cisco Cisco IOS XE Software
cisco ios_xe

Classification

Weakness

CWE-184 Incomplete List of Disallowed Inputs

Technology feeds

Cisco IOS rss critical rss

References

sec.cloudapps.cisco.com /security/center/content/CiscoSecurityAdvisory/cisco-sa-iosxe-priv-esc-seAx6NLX
vendor-advisory

Sources

CVE List CVE-2024-20278
NVD CVE-2024-20278

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Summary