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CVE-2026-20287

Cisco Identity Services Engine Hardening Release - Improper Privlege Management Vulnerabilities

Published: Sep 16, 2026Updated: Sep 18, 2026 Sources: CVE List NVDCWE-269
6.5MEDIUM
NVD MITRE
EPSS Score
0.2%
Top 88.1%
CISA KEV
Not in KEV
Exploits
0 Known
Remediation
No Fix Available
Self-Check
Not available

Description

As part of Cisco's ongoing commitment to proactive security and product quality, the Cisco Identity Services Engine (ISE) and Cisco ISE Passive Identity Connector (ISE-PIC) engineering teams have conducted a comprehensive internal security review. This review resulted in a software hardening release that addresses multiple internally discovered vulnerabilities. The vulnerabilities tracked by CVE-2026-20287 are related to improper privilege managment issues that are grouped under the Common Weakness Enumeration (CWE) Pillar CWE-269.

In plain language

AI Act now

This is a flaw in Cisco Identity Services Engine that may let someone who already has powerful access gain more control, and a typical small business using it should act urgently.

Executive summary

Improper privilege management (CWE-269) in Cisco Identity Services Engine and Cisco ISE Passive Identity Connector could enable privilege escalation by an authenticated, highly privileged attacker.

If affected, business impact
Expanded administrator controlIdentity-system compromiseAccess policy changesSensitive identity data exposureOperational disruption

What to do now

  1. Ask your IT team or Cisco support whether your Cisco Identity Services Engine deployment is affected by CVE-2026-20287.
  2. Check Cisco’s security advisory for an available fixed version; no patch or fixed version information is currently available.
  3. Restrict and review highly privileged administrator accounts until Cisco provides remediation.
  4. Review administrator activity for unexpected permission or access-policy changes.
May need vendor / contractor work

CVSS Vector Breakdown

AV:NAC:LPR:HUI:NS:UC:HI:HA:N
Exploitability
AV:NAttack Vector
Network
AC:LAttack Complexity
Low
PR:HPrivileges Required
High
UI:NUser Interaction
None
Scope
S:UScope
Unchanged
Impact
C:HConfidentiality
High
I:HIntegrity
High
A:NAvailability
None
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Weaknesses

CWE-269

Affected Products

Cisco
commercial·USaka cisco systems inc., cisco systems
Cisco Identity Services Engine Software
Networking Infrastructure
Cisco ISE Passive Identity Connector
Networking Infrastructure

Exploitability

0 exploit sources identified

Exploit details including PoC links, Metasploit modules, and scanner templates are available after registration.

View exploit details
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Attack Graph

Products CVE Techniques Tactics

Click technique nodes for MITRE ATT&CK details · drag to pan · Ctrl/⌘ + scroll to zoom, or go fullscreen.

MITRE ATT&CK

1 technique
Privilege Escalation
View detailed technique mapping

References

https://sec.cloudapps.cisco.com/security/center/content/CiscoSecurityAdvisory/cisco-sa-hardening-ise-XU5EwX5T
sec.cloudapps.cisco.com
News mentions
1

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