CRITICAL CWE-74
CVE-2026-20272
Cisco IOS XE Software Security Hardening Release
Cisco·IOS XE Software
9.8/ 10
CVSS 3.1
Critical severity
0.57%
EPSS exploit odds
Chance of exploitation in the next 30 days
Higher than 48% of all CVEs
Not listed
CISA KEV catalog
No confirmed in-the-wild exploitation on CISA's list.
Timeline
- Published
- Aug 5, 2026
- Updated
- Oct 2, 2026
- First covered
- Aug 6, 2026
- Latest story
- 3 months ago
Summary
As part of Cisco's ongoing commitment to proactive security and product quality, the Cisco IOS XE Software engineering team has conducted a comprehensive internal security review. This review resulted in software hardening releases that address multiple internally discovered vulnerabilities.The vulnerabilities tracked by CVE-2026-20272 are related to issues with improper neutralization of special elements that are grouped under the Common Weakness Enumeration (CWE) Pillar CWE-74.
CWE-74Improper Neutralization of Special Elements in Output Used by a Downstream Component ('Injection')
Attack profile
Attack vectorNetwork
ComplexityLow
PrivilegesNone
User interactionNone
ScopeUnchanged
ConfidentialityHigh
IntegrityHigh
AvailabilityHigh
CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:HAffected products
- Cisco IOS XE Software17.2.1a16.12.1y16.12.3s16.7.1b