CVE-2025-21367
Published: 11 February 2025
Summary
CVE-2025-21367 is a high-severity Use After Free (CWE-416) vulnerability in Microsoft Windows 10 1809. Its CVSS base score is 7.8 (High).
Operationally, exploitation aligns with the MITRE ATT&CK technique Exploitation for Privilege Escalation (T1068); ranked at the 34.2th percentile by exploit likelihood (below the median); it is not currently listed in the CISA KEV catalog.
The strongest mitigations our analysis identified are NIST 800-53 SI-2 (Flaw Remediation) and AC-6 (Least Privilege).
Threat & Defense at a Glance
Threat & Defense Details
Mitigating Controls (NIST 800-53 r5)AI
Directly remediates the Windows Win32 Kernel Subsystem elevation of privilege vulnerability by requiring timely application of vendor patches as specified in Microsoft's advisory.
Implements memory protection safeguards that mitigate exploitation of the use-after-free (CWE-416) vulnerability in the kernel subsystem by preventing unauthorized memory access.
Enforces least privilege for local low-privileged users (PR:L), limiting the potential impact and scope of privilege escalation attempts via the kernel vulnerability.
MITRE ATT&CK Enterprise TechniquesAI
Why these techniques?
This is a local kernel-mode privilege escalation vulnerability (CWE-416 use-after-free in Win32k subsystem) that directly enables T1068 Exploitation for Privilege Escalation from low-privileged local access.
NVD Description
Windows Win32 Kernel Subsystem Elevation of Privilege Vulnerability
Deeper analysisAI
CVE-2025-21367 is a Windows Win32 Kernel Subsystem Elevation of Privilege Vulnerability, published on 2025-02-11T18:15:34.943. It affects the Windows Win32 Kernel Subsystem and carries a CVSS v3.1 base score of 7.8 (AV:L/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:H). The vulnerability is associated with CWE-416 and NVD-CWE-noinfo.
A local attacker with low privileges (PR:L) can exploit this vulnerability with low attack complexity (AC:L) and no user interaction (UI:N) required. Successful exploitation enables elevation of privileges, resulting in high impacts on confidentiality (C:H), integrity (I:H), and availability (A:H).
Microsoft's advisory provides details on mitigations and patches at https://msrc.microsoft.com/update-guide/vulnerability/CVE-2025-21367.
Details
- CWE(s)