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Ivanti Connect Secure authentication bypass leading to unauthenticated command execution (CVSS 8.6), exploited as a zero-day chain with an unpatched root escalation by UTA0576 (Volexity, 2026-10-13); CISA KEV

cve · CVE-2026-104935

Coverage
1
first 2026-10-14 → last 2026-10-14
Latest activity
2026-10-14
Ivanti Connect Secure zero-day chain is exploited; its root step has no fix and it evades the Integrity…
Peak priority
critical
1 critical
Targets
technology
sectors: technology
Sources cited
5
5 hosts

Action items (3)

Do-now tasks recorded on the entries about CVE-2026-104935, newest first. Check the date before acting on an older one.

  • Immediate action: Ivanti and CISA confirm exploitation of CVE-2026-104935, and Volexity saw the chain used against a fully patched 22.8R2.4 appliance from 2026-10-03. Upgrade every Connect Secure appliance on 25.1.1.1 or earlier, 25.1.2.2 or earlier, or 22.8R2.4 or earlier to 25.1.1.2, 25.1.3.0 or 25.1.3.1, or 22.8R2.5, internet-facing ones first. Ivanti's Integrity Checker Tool cannot see this chain and the root-escalation step has no fix yet, so an appliance that was reachable on an affected build needs a compromise check and rotation of the Active Directory service account, LAPS passwords and other secrets it could reach.
    2026-10-14CVE-2026-104935
  • Upgrade every Ivanti Connect Secure appliance on 25.1.1.1 or earlier, 25.1.2.2 or earlier, or 22.8R2.4 or earlier to 25.1.1.2, 25.1.3.0 or 25.1.3.1, or 22.8R2.5 now, internet-facing appliances first; 22.7.x and below are not affected.
    2026-10-14CVE-2026-104935
  • Run a compromise check on every appliance that was reachable on an affected build, starting with proxy, load balancer or WAF logs back to at least 2026-10-03 for welcome.cgi requests that carry an X-DSCGI-PATH header; where compromise cannot be excluded, follow Ivanti's recovery steps and then reset the domain service account, LAPS and local passwords, certificates and API keys the appliance held.
    2026-10-14CVE-2026-104935

Defender insights

What each entry about CVE-2026-104935 tells a defender to do, newest first.

2026-10-14CRITICALexploitedIvanti Connect Secure zero-day chain is exploited; its root step has no fix and it evades the Integrity Checker

Exposure · detection

Story timeline

  1. 2026-10-14CVE-2026-104935, Ivanti Connect Secure: an authentication bypass chained to code execution is exploited as a zero-day, and the root-escalation step of the chain is still unpatched (CVSS 8.6)
    trending-vulnerabilitiesIvanti Connect Secure zero-day chain is exploited; its root step has no fix and it evades the Integrity Checker
ATT&CK techniques (9 across 8 tactics)

9 techniques observed across 1 entry about this entity, derived from entry metadata and body evidence, never asserted without a published entry behind it · pinned to MITRE ATT&CK v19.2 · compare on the matrix · Navigator layer (JSON)

  • Initial AccessExploit Public-Facing Application
  • ExecutionCommand and Scripting Interpreter: Python
  • Privilege EscalationExploitation for Privilege Escalation
  • Defense ImpairmentDisable or Modify Tools: Clear Linux or Mac System Logs
  • Credential AccessNetwork Sniffing · Brute Force: Password Spraying
  • DiscoveryNetwork Sniffing · Account Discovery: Domain Account
  • Command and ControlApplication Layer Protocol: Web Protocols
  • ExfiltrationExfiltration Over C2 Channel

Initial Access TA0001

T1190Exploit Public-Facing Application×1

Adversaries may attempt to exploit a weakness in an Internet-facing host or system to initially access a network. The weakness in the system can be a software bug, a temporary glitch, or a misconfiguration.

Evidence: 2026-10-14/cve-2026-104935-ivanti-connect-secure-zero-day-chain-kev · ATT&CK page ↗

Execution TA0002

T1059.006Command and Scripting Interpreter: Python×1

Adversaries may abuse Python commands and scripts for execution. Python is a very popular scripting/programming language, with capabilities to perform many functions. Python can be executed interactively from the command-line (via the <code>python.exe</code> interpreter) or via scripts (.py) that can be written and distributed to different systems. Python code can also be compiled into binary executables.

Evidence: 2026-10-14/cve-2026-104935-ivanti-connect-secure-zero-day-chain-kev · ATT&CK page ↗

Privilege Escalation TA0004

T1068Exploitation for Privilege Escalation×1

Adversaries may exploit software vulnerabilities in an attempt to elevate privileges. Exploitation of a software vulnerability occurs when an adversary takes advantage of a programming error in a program, service, or within the operating system software or kernel itself to execute adversary-controlled code. Security constructs such as permission levels will often hinder access to information and use of certain techniques, so adversaries will likely need to perform privilege escalation to include use of software exploitation to circumvent those restrictions.

Evidence: 2026-10-14/cve-2026-104935-ivanti-connect-secure-zero-day-chain-kev · ATT&CK page ↗

Defense Impairment TA0112

T1685.006Disable or Modify Tools: Clear Linux or Mac System Logs×1

Adversaries may clear system logs to hide evidence of an intrusion. macOS and Linux both keep track of system or user-initiated actions via system logs. The majority of native system logging is stored under the `/var/log/` directory. Subfolders in this directory categorize logs by their related functions, such as:

Evidence: 2026-10-14/cve-2026-104935-ivanti-connect-secure-zero-day-chain-kev · ATT&CK page ↗

Credential Access TA0006

T1040Network Sniffing×1

Adversaries may passively sniff network traffic to capture information about an environment, including authentication material passed over the network. Network sniffing refers to using the network interface on a system to monitor or capture information sent over a wired or wireless connection. An adversary may place a network interface into promiscuous mode to passively access data in transit over the network, or use span ports to capture a larger amount of data.

Evidence: 2026-10-14/cve-2026-104935-ivanti-connect-secure-zero-day-chain-kev · ATT&CK page ↗

T1110.003Brute Force: Password Spraying×1

Adversaries may use a single or small list of commonly used passwords against many different accounts to attempt to acquire valid account credentials. Password spraying uses one password (e.g. 'Password01'), or a small list of commonly used passwords, that may match the complexity policy of the domain. Logins are attempted with that password against many different accounts on a network to avoid account lockouts that would normally occur when brute forcing a single account with many passwords.

Evidence: 2026-10-14/cve-2026-104935-ivanti-connect-secure-zero-day-chain-kev · ATT&CK page ↗

Discovery TA0007

T1040Network Sniffing×1

Adversaries may passively sniff network traffic to capture information about an environment, including authentication material passed over the network. Network sniffing refers to using the network interface on a system to monitor or capture information sent over a wired or wireless connection. An adversary may place a network interface into promiscuous mode to passively access data in transit over the network, or use span ports to capture a larger amount of data.

Evidence: 2026-10-14/cve-2026-104935-ivanti-connect-secure-zero-day-chain-kev · ATT&CK page ↗

T1087.002Account Discovery: Domain Account×1

Adversaries may attempt to get a listing of domain accounts. This information can help adversaries determine which domain accounts exist to aid in follow-on behavior such as targeting specific accounts which possess particular privileges.

Evidence: 2026-10-14/cve-2026-104935-ivanti-connect-secure-zero-day-chain-kev · ATT&CK page ↗

Command and Control TA0011

T1071.001Application Layer Protocol: Web Protocols×1

Adversaries may communicate using application layer protocols associated with web traffic to avoid detection/network filtering by blending in with existing traffic. Commands to the remote system, and often the results of those commands, will be embedded within the protocol traffic between the client and server.

Evidence: 2026-10-14/cve-2026-104935-ivanti-connect-secure-zero-day-chain-kev · ATT&CK page ↗

Exfiltration TA0010

T1041Exfiltration Over C2 Channel×1

Adversaries may steal data by exfiltrating it over an existing command and control channel. Stolen data is encoded into the normal communications channel using the same protocol as command and control communications.

Evidence: 2026-10-14/cve-2026-104935-ivanti-connect-secure-zero-day-chain-kev · ATT&CK page ↗

Entries about Ivanti Connect Secure authentication bypass leading to unauthenticated command execution (CVSS 8.6), exploited as a zero-day chain with an unpatched root escalation by UTA0576 (Volexity, 2026-10-13); CISA KEV (1)

2026-10-14 · view entry permalink →

CRITICALCVE-2026-104935exploitedNATOA1

CVE-2026-104935, Ivanti Connect Secure: an authentication bypass chained to code execution is exploited as a zero-day, and the root-escalation step of the chain is still unpatched (CVSS 8.6)

Ivanti disclosed a vulnerability in limited versions of Connect Secure on 2026-10-13 and says it is aware of limited exploitation in the wild (Ivanti, 2026-10-13). Rapid7 describes CVE-2026-104935 as an authentication bypass by spoofing that lets a remote unauthenticated attacker run commands, and scores it CVSS 8.6 (Rapid7, 2026-10-13). CISA added CVE-2026-104935 to its Known Exploited Vulnerabilities catalog the same day (CISA, 2026-10-13). Volexity found the activity on 2026-10-05, tracks the operator as UTA0576, a previously unknown cluster it assesses with low confidence as criminal, and dates exploitation of a fully patched 22.8R2.4 appliance to 2026-10-03 (Volexity, 2026-10-13).

The chain has three steps. A request to the public login script welcome.cgi names a protected script in an X-DSCGI-PATH header, so the URL passes the authentication check while the header picks the destination. The upload script wu.cgi writes a file to disk before checking that it is a ZIP, and parallel requests run a Perl script before it is deleted. A root escalation then abuses the dsinvoked service's trust in the shared DSCache configuration store (Volexity, 2026-10-13). Ivanti tracks the first two steps under CVE-2026-104935 and has not fixed the root escalation, which it says will ship in a future release in the coming weeks (Volexity, 2026-10-13). Every command re-runs the whole chain over HTTPS with no web shell or backdoor, and the exploit patches library code in memory only, so Ivanti's Integrity Checker Tool, which looks for file changes, does not detect it; Volexity also found entries removed from the debug and audit logs (Volexity, 2026-10-13). The operator then went after the Active Directory service account stored on the appliance: LDAP queries for LAPS passwords, BitLocker recovery keys and password attributes, a Kerberoast-capable tool, password spraying, and packet capture of plaintext LDAP, HTTP Basic and NTLM traffic (Volexity, 2026-10-13).

At the time of disclosure, Ivanti is aware of limited exploitation in the wild.

Ivanti 2026-10-13

In the first week of October 2026, Volexity discovered an unknown threat actor, UTA0576, abusing a zero-day exploit chain to compromise a fully patched (at the time, version 22.8R2.4) Ivanti Connect Secure (ICS) VPN appliance.

because this exploit chain patches library code in memory only and restores configuration store data, the tool does not detect any modifications.

Ivanti is working on a fix for the privilege escalation vulnerability, and it will be included in a future release in the coming weeks.

Volexity 2026-10-13

apply the appropriate update on an emergency basis outside of normal patching cycles

Rapid7 2026-10-13
vulnerability14 Oct 03:38Zmulti-sourceOpen finding →

Co-occurring entities

Derived: referenced by the same focused operational entries (weekly summaries and report roundups don't count); ×N counts the shared entries.

Where this entity is cited

  • Vulns1

Source distribution

  • cisa.gov1 (20%)
  • cyber.gc.ca1 (20%)
  • ivanti.com1 (20%)
  • rapid7.com1 (20%)
  • volexity.com1 (20%)