Raw vector
CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:L/PR:N/UI:R/S:U/C:H/I:N/A:NSummary
CVE-2026-20653 is a medium-severity Path Traversal (CWE-22) vulnerability in Apple Macos. Its CVSS base score is 5.5 (Medium).
Operationally, exploitation aligns with the MITRE ATT&CK technique Data from Local System (T1005); ranked at the 5th percentile by exploit likelihood (below the median); it is not currently listed in the CISA KEV catalog.
The strongest mitigations our analysis identified map to AC-3 (Access Enforcement) and SI-10 (Information Input Validation) — see the control section below for these in your framework.
OWASP Top 10 for Web (2025)
EU & UK References
- 🇪🇺 ENISA EUVD: EUVD-2026-6712
Vulnerability Data
A parsing issue in the handling of directory paths was addressed with improved path validation. This issue is fixed in iOS 18.7.5 and iPadOS 18.7.5, iOS 26.3 and iPadOS 26.3, macOS Sequoia 15.7.4, macOS Sonoma 14.8.4, macOS Tahoe 26.3, visionOS…
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26.3. An app may be able to access sensitive user data.
- CWE(s)
Related Threats
MITRE ATT&CK Enterprise TechniquesAI
Why these techniques?
CWE-22 path traversal enables unauthorized access to sensitive local files/data.
CVEs Like This One
Affected Assets
Mitigating Controls
Control response
Mitigating Controls (NIST 800-53 r5) AI
Directly mitigates the path-traversal parsing flaw by validating directory-path inputs before they are used to access files.
Enforces access-control policy on file-system objects so that even a malformed path cannot reach sensitive user data outside the app's sandbox.
Limits the privileges granted to the app, reducing the set of files that could be reached if path validation fails.
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.
Patching/maintenance can remediate known path-traversal flaws in deployed software (partial prevention of exploitability) but does nothing to stop the coding defect from being introduced in the first place.
PR.AA-05 defines and reviews access policies but does not address code-level pathname neutralization, so neither direction prevents CWE-22.
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.
Security testing in development catches path traversal via static/dynamic analysis.
Secure SDLC mandates input validation and path sanitization that directly prevent path traversal.
Application security requirements include rules for safe file handling and canonicalization.
Secure architecture principles require least-privilege file access and directory isolation.
Secure coding standards explicitly forbid unsafe path construction and mandate safe APIs.
Information access restriction limits which files an application may read or write.