What is CVE-2023-21896?

CVE-2023-21896 is a high-severity vulnerability in Oracle Solaris, classified under Improper Privilege Management. CVSS score: 7.0/10. Published 2023-04-18.

How severe is CVE-2023-21896?

High severity. CVSS v3 base score is 7.0 out of 10.

Privilege escalation in Oracle Solaris

CVE-2023-21896

Vulnerability in the Oracle Solaris product of Oracle Systems (component: NSSwitch). Supported versions that are affected are 10 and 11. Difficult to exploit vulnerability allows low privileged attacker with logon to the infrastructure where Oracle Solaris executes to compromise Oracle Solaris. Successful attacks of this vulnerability can result in takeover of Oracle Solaris. CVSS 3.1 Base Score 7.0 (Confidentiality, Integrity and Availability impacts). CVSS Vector: (CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:H/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:H).

Vulnerability class: Privilege Escalation

Published 2023-04-18 · last modified 2026-06-17.

CVSS v3 metric

CVSS v3 base score 7.0 (High). Vector: CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:H/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:H.

EPSS exploit prediction

EPSS: 0.002 (5.6th percentile), scored 2026-10-03.

Very low probability of exploitation in the next 30 days; routine patching cadence is appropriate. 6th percentile — 5.6% of CVEs in the catalogue have a lower EPSS than this one. How to read EPSS.

EPSS over last 30 days · oldest: 0.002 · newest: 0.002 · change: 0.000

Affected products

Oracle Solaris — versions 10, 11
Oracle Corporation Solaris Operating System — versions 10, 11

Weakness classification (CWE)

CWE-269 — Improper Privilege Management

References

www.oracle.com/security-alerts/cpuapr2023.html (vendor-advisory, Patch, Vendor Advisory)

Frequently asked questions

What is CVE-2023-21896?: CVE-2023-21896 is a high-severity vulnerability in Oracle Solaris, classified under Improper Privilege Management. CVSS score: 7.0/10. Published 2023-04-18.
How severe is CVE-2023-21896?: High severity. CVSS v3 base score is 7.0 out of 10.