Raw vector
CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:H/UI:N/S:C/C:H/I:H/A:HSummary
CVE-2025-6000 is a critical-severity Code Injection (CWE-94) vulnerability in Hashicorp Vault. Its CVSS base score is 9.1 (Critical).
Operationally, exploitation aligns with the MITRE ATT&CK technique Command and Scripting Interpreter (T1059); ranked in the top 45% of CVEs by exploit likelihood; it is not currently listed in the CISA KEV catalog.
The strongest mitigations our analysis identified map to SA-11 (Developer Testing and Evaluation) and SI-10 (Information Input Validation) — see the control section below for these in your framework.
Deeper analysis AI-assisted summary
Synthesised by an AI model from the NVD description and linked references — a reading aid, not an authoritative source.
CVE-2025-6000 is a code injection vulnerability (CWE-94) affecting HashiCorp Vault, a secrets management tool. It allows a privileged Vault operator within the root namespace who has write permission to the {{sys/audit}} path to achieve arbitrary code execution on the underlying host, provided a plugin directory is configured in Vault's settings. The issue has a CVSS v3.1 base score of 9.1 (AV:N/AC:L/PR:H/UI:N/S:C/C:H/I:H/A:H) and was published on 2025-08-01.
An attacker must possess high privileges as a Vault operator in the root namespace with write access to {{sys/audit}}. Exploitation requires a plugin directory to be set in the Vault configuration, enabling the operator to inject and execute malicious code directly on the host operating system, potentially leading to full compromise of the Vault host.
HashiCorp's security advisory (HCSEC-2025-14) details the fix, available in Vault Community Edition 1.20.1 and Vault Enterprise versions 1.20.1, 1.19.7, 1.18.12, and 1.16.23. Security practitioners should upgrade to these patched releases and review configurations to ensure plugin directories are not unnecessarily enabled or accessible.
OWASP Top 10 for Web (2025)
EU & UK References
- 🇪🇺 ENISA EUVD: EUVD-2025-23387
Vulnerability Data
A privileged Vault operator within the root namespace with write permission to {{sys/audit}} may obtain code execution on the underlying host if a plugin directory is set in Vault’s configuration. Fixed in Vault Community Edition 1.20.1 and Vault Enterprise 1.20.1,…
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1.19.7, 1.18.12, and 1.16.23.
- CWE(s)
Related Threats
MITRE ATT&CK Enterprise Techniques
CVEs Like This One
Affected Assets
Mitigating Controls
Control response
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V1.3.1
Mitigating Controls (NIST 800-53 r5) AI
Developer testing and evaluation finds code paths that accept and execute externally influenced strings.
Input validation directly stops untrusted data from being used to construct executable code without neutralization.
Least privilege limits the damage an injected code fragment can perform once executed.
Requiring documented secure development standards and tools enforces use of safe code-generation APIs and escaping.
Mitigating Controls (NIST CSF 2.0) AI
Derived directly from the weakness types (CWEs) cited in the NVD entry via our AI-authored CWE→CSF cross-walk (authority under review) — links open the control.
PR.PS-06's SDLC practices directly target injection flaws via secure coding and testing (mostly), yet as a single broad outcome it leaves many code-generation specifics unaddressed (partial).
PR.DS-10 protects runtime data confidentiality/integrity but has no bearing on neutralizing externally influenced input during code generation, so neither direction shows any preventive effect.
Mitigating Controls (ISO/IEC 27001:2022 Annex A) AI
Derived directly from the weakness types (CWEs) cited in the NVD entry via our AI-authored CWE→ISO cross-walk (authority under review) — links open the control.
Banning unapproved code samples and unauthenticated web services, combined with secure-coding standards and SAST, prevents the dynamic generation or inclusion of attacker-supplied code.
Controls that restrict unauthorized or malicious code from being introduced via external networks or removable media limit opportunities for an attacker to inject and execute arbitrary code.