Raw vector
CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:NSummary
CVE-2026-21721 is a high-severity Incorrect Authorization (CWE-863) vulnerability in Grafana Grafana. Its CVSS base score is 8.1 (High).
Operationally, exploitation aligns with the MITRE ATT&CK technique Exploitation for Privilege Escalation (T1068); ranked at the 48th 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-24 (Access Control Decisions) and AC-25 (Reference Monitor) — 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-2026-21721 is a vulnerability in Grafana's dashboard permissions API, where the API does not verify the target dashboard scope and only checks for the dashboards.permissions:* action. This flaw enables a user with permission management rights on one dashboard to read and modify permissions on other dashboards, resulting in an organization-internal privilege escalation. The issue carries a CVSS v3.1 base score of 8.1 (AV:N/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:N) and maps to CWE-863 (Incorrect Authorization). It was published on 2026-01-27.
The attack requires low privileges, specifically the ability to manage permissions on at least one dashboard, along with network access to the Grafana instance. Exploitation has low complexity, needs no user interaction, and maintains unchanged scope. A successful attacker can achieve high confidentiality impact by reading permissions on other dashboards and high integrity impact by modifying them, facilitating broader privilege escalation within the organization.
Grafana has published a security advisory at https://grafana.com/security/security-advisories/cve-2026-21721 detailing the vulnerability.
OWASP Top 10 for Web (2025)
EU & UK References
- 🇪🇺 ENISA EUVD: EUVD-2026-4820
Vulnerability Data
The dashboard permissions API does not verify the target dashboard scope and only checks the dashboards.permissions:* action. As a result, a user who has permission management rights on one dashboard can read and modify permissions on other dashboards. This is…
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an organization‑internal privilege escalation.
- CWE(s)
Related Threats
MITRE ATT&CK Enterprise Techniques
CVEs Like This One
Affected Assets
Mitigating Controls
Control response
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- 5 hardening rules · 3 OS baselines
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Mitigating Controls (NIST 800-53 r5) AI
AC-3 directly requires correct enforcement of authorization decisions on every access request, structurally preventing incorrect checks.
AC-24 ensures access-control decisions are made and applied consistently, reducing the chance of an incorrect authorization result.
A reference monitor that is always invoked and tamper-proof forces every authorization decision through a verified, correct path.
Least-privilege assignments shrink the set of authorizations that must be checked correctly, limiting exposure to flawed checks.
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.
Enforcing authorization policy and least privilege directly blocks user-controlled key tampering that bypasses access checks.
Logical access controls prevent unauthorized data access that results from missing authorization checks on object references.
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 can detect missing authorization checks but does not prevent the weakness in production.
Information access restriction explicitly enforces that users may only retrieve data they are authorized to see, directly addressing user-controlled key bypass.
Requiring consistency between access rights and classification plus formal approval steps ensures that the authorization logic correctly distinguishes between entities that should and should not be granted access.
Enforcing policy-driven approval and role-change reviews stops incorrect or stale authorization decisions from remaining in effect after job changes or terminations.
Privileged access rights control restricts what data each user may access, mitigating direct object reference attacks.
Secure development lifecycle includes authorization design but does not itself implement runtime access checks.
Hardening callouts derived
Configuration rules from DISA STIG baselines that bear on weaknesses of the type cited by this CVE. Each rule is shown with the relationship its mapping actually records, against the CWE it was authored against. Derived via CVE→CWE over `controls_xwalks` (authoritative rows only; rows rated `none` are excluded).
Oracle Linux 8 (2 rules)
- V-248581 OL 8 must require users to provide a password for privilege escalation. prevents CWE-863
- V-252656 The OL 8 operating system must not be configured to bypass password requirements for privilege escalation. prevents CWE-863
RHEL 7 (1 rule)
- V-204430 The Red Hat Enterprise Linux operating system must be configured so that users must re-authenticate for privilege escalation. prevents CWE-863
RHEL 8 (1 rule)
- V-251712 The RHEL 8 operating system must not be configured to bypass password requirements for privilege escalation. prevents CWE-863