Privilege escalation in Hashicorp Vault

CVE-2025-5999

A privileged Vault operator with write permissions to the root namespace’s identity endpoint could escalate their own or another user’s token privileges to Vault’s root policy. Fixed in Vault Community Edition 1.20.0 and Vault Enterprise 1…

EPSS: 0.002 (36.3th percentile) — read the EPSS interpretation.

CVSS v3 metric

CVSS v3 base score 7.2 (High). Vector: CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:H/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:H.

Affected products

Weakness classification (CWE)

Public proof-of-concept exploits

References

Frequently asked questions

What is CVE-2025-5999?
CVE-2025-5999 is a high-severity vulnerability in Hashicorp Vault, classified under Incorrect Privilege Assignment. CVSS score: 7.2/10. Published 2025-08-01.
How severe is CVE-2025-5999?
High severity. CVSS v3 base score is 7.2 out of 10.
Is CVE-2025-5999 known to be exploited?
2 public proof-of-concept repositories are indexed. Not currently listed in the CISA KEV catalog.