Privilege escalation in Acustica-Audio Aquarius Helpertool

CVE-2025-65842

The Aquarius HelperTool (1.0.003) privileged XPC service on macOS contains multiple flaws that allow local privilege escalation. The service accepts XPC connections from any local process without validating the client's identity, and its authorization logic incorrectly calls AuthorizationCopyRights with a NULL reference, causing all authorization checks to succeed. The executeCommand:authorization:withReply: method then interpolates attacker-controlled input into NSTask and executes it with root privileges. A local attacker can exploit these weaknesses to run arbitrary commands as root, create persistent backdoors, or obtain a fully interactive root shell.

EPSS: 0.001 (4.6th percentile) — read the EPSS interpretation.

CVSS v3 metric

CVSS v3 base score 5.1 (Medium). Vector: CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:L/I:L/A:N.

Affected products

Weakness classification (CWE)

References

Frequently asked questions

What is CVE-2025-65842?
CVE-2025-65842 is a medium-severity vulnerability in Acustica-Audio Aquarius Helpertool, classified under Incorrect Privilege Assignment. CVSS score: 5.1/10. Published 2025-12-03.
How severe is CVE-2025-65842?
Medium severity. CVSS v3 base score is 5.1 out of 10.