Raw vector
CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:L/PR:H/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:HSummary
CVE-2026-40638 is a medium-severity Execution with Unnecessary Privileges (CWE-250) vulnerability in Dell Insightiq. Its CVSS base score is 6.7 (Medium).
Operationally, exploitation aligns with the MITRE ATT&CK technique Exploitation for Privilege Escalation (T1068); ranked at the 2th 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-6 (Least Privilege) and AC-3 (Access Enforcement) — see the control section below for these in your framework.
EU & UK References
- 🇪🇺 ENISA EUVD: EUVD-2026-29472
Vulnerability Data
Dell PowerScale InsightIQ, versions 5.0.0 through 6.2.0, contains an execution with unnecessary privileges vulnerability. A high privileged attacker with local access could potentially exploit this vulnerability, leading to elevation of privileges.
- CWE(s)
Related Threats
MITRE ATT&CK Enterprise TechniquesAI
Why these techniques?
Local privilege escalation via execution with unnecessary privileges (CWE-250) directly maps to exploitation for privilege escalation.
CVEs Like This One
Affected Assets
Mitigating Controls
Control response
Mitigating Controls (NIST 800-53 r5) AI
Directly requires that processes and accounts execute only with the minimum privileges needed, eliminating the unnecessary privileges that enable the local escalation in InsightIQ.
Enforces access decisions so that even a high-privileged local account cannot exceed the rights granted to InsightIQ components.
Restricts the software to only the functions and privilege levels required, preventing the unnecessary elevated execution path described in the CVE.
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.AA-05 directly enforces least privilege so largely eliminates CWE-250 at design time, yet the weakness can still arise from runtime escalation paths, third-party code, or misapplied role definitions outside this single control.
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.
Requiring explicit justification and time-limited grants discourages the routine allocation of unnecessary privileges that would otherwise allow execution with more rights than required.
Restricting privileged utilities to the fewest trusted users and requiring explicit authorization directly stops developers or operators from embedding or invoking code that runs with unnecessary elevated rights.
Mandating separate non-privileged identities for routine work and restricting privileged accounts to administrative tasks reduces the chance that everyday operations run with unnecessary elevated rights.
The control explicitly calls for minimizing privileged identities and disabling unnecessary accounts, thereby reducing the number of processes that run with unnecessary privileges.
The requirement to restrict privileged access and apply segregation of duties limits the number of processes or accounts that must run with elevated rights, lowering the impact of unnecessary privilege assignments.
Forcing distinct roles for initiating versus executing changes reduces the chance that an individual will run with unnecessary privileges to perform both steps.