CVE-2026-20960
Published: 16 January 2026
Summary
CVE-2026-20960 is a high-severity Improper Authorization (CWE-285) vulnerability in Microsoft Power Apps. Its CVSS base score is 8.0 (High).
Operationally, exploitation aligns with the MITRE ATT&CK technique Exploit Public-Facing Application (T1190); ranked at the 22.4th 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 AC-3 (Access Enforcement) and SI-2 (Flaw Remediation).
Deeper analysis
CVE-2026-20960 is an improper authorization vulnerability affecting Microsoft Power Apps, published on 2026-01-16. It stems from issues mapped to CWE-285 (Improper Authorization) and CWE-863 (Incorrect Authorization), enabling an authorized attacker to execute code over a network. The vulnerability carries a CVSS v3.1 base score of 8.0 (AV:N/AC:L/PR:L/UI:R/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:H).
Exploitation requires low privileges (PR:L) and occurs over the network (AV:N) with low attack complexity (AC:L), though it demands user interaction (UI:R). Successful attacks result in high impacts to confidentiality, integrity, and availability (C:H/I:H/A:H) without changing scope (S:U), allowing the attacker to execute arbitrary code.
Microsoft's Security Response Center provides an update guide with mitigation details at https://msrc.microsoft.com/update-guide/vulnerability/CVE-2026-20960.
EU & UK References
- 🇪🇺 ENISA EUVD: EUVD-2026-3112
Vulnerability details
Improper authorization in Microsoft Power Apps allows an authorized attacker to execute code over a network.
- CWE(s)
Related Threats
MITRE ATT&CK Enterprise TechniquesAI
Why these techniques?
Improper authorization in network-accessible Power Apps directly enables remote arbitrary code execution (T1190) via command/script interpreters (T1059).
CVEs Like This One
Affected Assets
Mitigating Controls
Mitigating Controls (NIST 800-53 r5) AI
Directly enforces approved authorizations for access to system resources, mitigating improper authorization (CWE-285/863) that allows low-privilege attackers to execute arbitrary code in Power Apps.
Applies least privilege to restrict low-privilege (PR:L) users from performing unauthorized actions like code execution despite flawed authorization checks.
Ensures timely identification, reporting, and patching of the specific Power Apps authorization flaw as detailed in Microsoft's update guide, preventing network-based exploitation.