CVE-2026-45647: Microsoft Defender for Endpoint for Mac Elevation of Privilege Vulnerability
Time-of-check time-of-use (toctou) race condition in Microsoft Defender for Endpoint allows an authorized attacker to elevate privileges locally.
CSIRTS triage
- What
- Time-of-check time-of-use (toctou) race condition in Microsoft Defender for Endpoint allows an authorized attacker to elevate privileges locally.
- Who is affected
- Authorized attackers with access to the system can exploit this vulnerability.
- Urgency
- Remediation is medium urgency due to the potential for privilege escalation.
- Action
- Apply the latest security updates from Microsoft.
AI-assisted analysis generated from the source advisory — verify against the original.
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Details
Original advisory: https://msrc.microsoft.com/update-guide/vulnerability/CVE-2026-45647
Exploitation outlook
EPSS (FIRST.org) estimates each CVE’s probability of exploitation in the next 30 days — here is the CSIRTS.com read on those numbers.
- Low exploitation riskCVE-2026-456470.21% 30-day exploitation probability — currently an unlikely target, but scores change as exploit code circulates. Riskier than 12% of all scored CVEs.
Referenced CVEs
| CVE | CSIRTS overview | External |
|---|---|---|
| CVE-2026-45647 | coverage & exploitation status | NVD · CVE.org |
Recent advisories for Microsoft Defender for
A cluster of recent advisories against the same product widens the attack surface — attackers routinely chain freshly published CVEs on one product, so review these together.
- highCVE-2026-50656: Microsoft Defender Elevation of Privilege Vulnerabilitymsrc · 2026-06-09
- criticalexploitedCVE-2026-45498: Microsoft Defender Denial of Service Vulnerabilitycisa-kev · 2026-05-20
- criticalexploitedCVE-2026-41091: Microsoft Defender Link Following Vulnerabilitycisa-kev · 2026-05-20
- criticalexploitedCVE-2026-33825: Microsoft Defender Insufficient Granularity of Access Control Vulnerabilitycisa-kev · 2026-04-22
- criticalexploitedCVE-2023-32049: Microsoft Windows Defender SmartScreen Security Feature Bypass Vulnerabilitycisa-kev · 2023-07-11
- criticalexploitedCVE-2022-44698: Microsoft Defender SmartScreen Security Feature Bypass Vulnerabilitycisa-kev · 2022-12-13
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