Raw vector
CVSS:4.0/AV:L/AC:L/AT:P/PR:L/UI:N/VC:H/VI:H/VA:H/SC:N/SI:N/SA:N/E:X/CR:X/IR:X/AR:X/MAV:X/MAC:X/MAT:X/MPR:X/MUI:X/MVC:X/MVI:X/MVA:X/MSC:X/MSI:X/MSA:X/S:X/AU:X/R:X/V:X/RE:X/U:XCVSS and EPSS are reproduced from their sources (NVD, FIRST EPSS). Risk Priority is our own derived reading, not an NVD score.
Summary
CVE-2026-41288 is a high-severity Incorrect Permission Assignment for Critical Resource (CWE-732) vulnerability in Watchguard Agent. Its CVSS base score is 7.3 (High).
Operationally, ranked at the 4th 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 AC-6 (Least Privilege) — see the control section below for these in your framework.
OWASP Top 10 for Web (2025)
EU & UK References
- 🇪🇺 ENISA EUVD: EUVD-2026-27836
Vulnerability Data
Incorrect permission assignment for a resource in the patch management component of the WatchGuard Agent on Windows allows an authenticated local user to elevate their privileges to NT AUTHORITY\\SYSTEM.
- CWE(s)
Related Threats
CVEs Like This One
Affected Assets
Mitigating Controls
Mitigating Controls (NIST 800-53 r5) AI
Enforces the access control policy that defines permissions on resources, thereby stopping incorrect assignments from remaining exploitable.
Directly requires assignment of only the minimum necessary permissions, preventing overly broad grants on critical resources.
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.
A.5.15 directly requires determining access needs, defining and communicating an access control policy, implementing rules that map rights/restrictions to entities (including consistency with classification), and considering need-to-know, privileged restrictions, segregation, formal authorization, and dynamic factors — which squarely stops most incorrect permission assignments from being exploitable; the bounded remainder is misconfigurations that violate the policy itself.
A.5.18 directly governs the provisioning, review, adjustment and revocation of logical access rights (including for critical resources) according to business needs, policy, SoD and risk, which stops most unintended actors from reading/modifying via incorrect permissions; the bounded remainder is incorrect permission assignments that are not access-right decisions at all (e.g. filesystem umask, ACL syntax errors).
A.8.2 directly controls the allocation, review, expiry, and use of privileged rights (including least-privilege, temporary grants, no generic IDs, and higher authentication), which stops most unintended read/modify cases named by CWE-732; the bounded remainder is non-privileged incorrect permission assignments (e.g. on files or objects that never require privilege).
Requiring explicit configuration of access controls and permissions for files, applications and services counters the assignment of overly permissive default or incorrect file-system rights.
A.8.32's formal change process (impact assessment, authorization, testing per 8.29, documentation, and enforcement across the SDLC) prevents most incorrect permission assignments on critical resources by catching them before or during implementation; the bounded remainder is ad-hoc/emergency changes or post-deployment permission drift outside the managed process.
A.8.4 strictly controls read/write access to source code and associated critical resources per roles/business needs (with audit and change-control integration), directly preventing most unintended read/modify cases in CWE-732; the bounded remainder is misconfigured permissions on non-source-code critical resources (e.g. configs, keys, or runtime artifacts) outside the clause's explicit scope.
Hardening callouts derived
DISA STIG baselines are authored against specific weaknesses. Where this CVE cites a broad weakness class, the mapping is not asserted at that abstraction (owner ruling, 2026-09-25: grade only at Base and below), so no rule is shown here rather than a rule shown against the wrong grain.