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CISA KEVcriticalAuth Bypasspublic exploit

CVE-2025-32975

Quest KACE Systems Management Appliance (SMA) Improper Authentication Vulnerability

Quest KACE Systems Management Appliance (SMA) 13.0.x before 13.0.385, 13.1.x before 13.1.81, 13.2.x before 13.2.183, 14.0.x before 14.0.341 (Patch 5), and 14.1.x before 14.1.101 (Patch 4) contains an authentication bypass vulnerability that allows attackers to impersonate legitimate users without valid credentials. The vulnerability exists in the SSO authentication handling mechanism and can lead to complete administrative takeover.

Published Updated Sources: NVD, Quest (CNA), CISA, FIRST EPSS, GitHub, GitHub Security Advisory

Triage

Is it exploited, how likely is exploitation, what does it touch, and how severe do the scoring sources call it.

Exploitation

Confirmed

CISA KEV, listed Apr 20, 2026

EPSS

2%

ahead of 83% of scored CVEs

Affects

Quest

KACE Systems Management Appliance (SMA)

CVSS base

10

critical

CISA SSVC assessment

Three decision points CISA publishes for the CVEs it assesses · SSVC 2.0.3. A stakeholder decision, not a severity score.

CISA

Exploitation

Active

none · proof-of-concept · active

Automatable

Yes

can an attacker script all four kill-chain steps

Technical impact

Total

partial · total control of the vulnerable component

Remediation

The vendor's own words where we have them.

Upgrade KACE Systems Management Appliance (SMA) to a fixed release. Apply vendor patches per advisory and restrict external exposure of the affected component until patched.

CISA required action

Apply mitigations per vendor instructions, follow applicable BOD 22-01 guidance for cloud services, or discontinue use of the product if mitigations are unavailable.

Federal deadline May 4, 2026 — passed 111 days ago

First 24 hours

Ordered from the record's own fields — exposure first, because you cannot patch what you have not found.

  • Identify exposed assets running affected vendor/product/version combinations.
  • Treat as emergency remediation because CISA KEV status is present.
  • Search available logs for exploit probes, errors, authentication anomalies, or suspicious child processes matching the vulnerability class.

Affected scope

Vendor, product and version as the advisories word them.

VendorProductVersionsStatus
QuestKACE Systems Management Appliance (SMA)Vulnerable

Attack characteristics

The CVSS vector, decoded. It describes the attack, not your exposure to it.

Availability

High

Confidentiality

High

Integrity

High

Scope

Changed

Attack Complexity

Low

Attack Vector

Network

Privileges Req

None

User Interaction

None

Every base score collected

Sources score independently and disagree; each row says who scored it and under which version.

ScoreVersionSeverityExpl.ImpactSource
10CVSS 3.1critical3.96CNA, GHSA

CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:C/C:H/I:H/A:H

Weakness & attack patterns

  • CWE-287Improper Authentication

Inferred from the weakness class — not observed against this CVE.

CAPEC-115 · Authentication BypassCAPEC-94 · Adversary in the Middle
  • T1548Abuse Elevation Control Mechanism
  • T1040Network Sniffing
  • T1185Browser Session Hijacking

CISA KEV details

CISA lists a CVE here once it has evidence of exploitation against real targets.

Listed

Apr 20, 2026

Federal deadline

May 4, 2026

passed 111 days ago

Ransomware use

Unknown

CISA records ransomware use only for campaigns it has confirmed, so “Unknown” means unrecorded, not ruled out. The deadline binds US federal agencies; for everyone else it is a date to argue against.

Public exploit

Capability, not use: code existing is a different claim from anyone running it.

Repositories

2

Detection

Read off the CVSS vector and the weakness class. Starting points, not rules we have tested.

  • Prioritize edge telemetry for network-reachable KACE Systems Management Appliance (SMA).
  • Monitor for scanner or exploit-pattern traffic after 2 public PoC repositories were reported.
web/proxy/WAF logsapplication logsnetwork IDS/IPSidentity provider logsauthentication audit logs

Timeline

What happened to this CVE, newest first — with the readings a source repeats on a schedule counted underneath rather than listed.

  1. 2026
  2. Added · CVSS 3.1 10.0 (AV:N)

    Jun 17, 2026 · NVD

  3. Added to CISA KEV catalog

    Apr 20, 2026 · CISA

  4. 2025
  5. Added · GHSA-hrwx-88rh-95q7 published (critical)

    Jun 26, 2025 · GitHub Security Advisory

  6. Initial · CVE published

    Jun 24, 2025 · NVD

References

7 on the record

Elsewhere on this site

Not in any source we poll

Listed rather than left blank: an empty field and an unmeasured one look identical on screen, and only one is a reason to look elsewhere.

  • No confirmed IOCs, IP addresses, domains, file hashes, or malware artifacts supplied.
  • No organization-specific asset inventory, compensating-control status, or patch deployment evidence supplied.
  • No exploit packet captures, log samples, or incident case IDs supplied.
Answered from this record1

What should defenders know first?

CVE-2025-32975 is Quest KACE Systems Management Appliance (SMA) Improper Authentication Vulnerability, a critical vulnerability affecting KACE Systems Management Appliance (SMA) from Quest. The current evidence lists it in CISA KEV, and the exploit status is: Yes: CISA KEV signal present. Public exploit evidence is: 2 public PoC repositories reported; 0 marked weaponized in current dataset. The affected-version evidence is listed in the key facts and affected products tables. Defenders should first verify whether exposed or business-critical assets run those versions, then apply vendor patches or mitigations, restrict reachable attack surface, and preserve logs for detection review. CVSS 10 describes technical severity, while EPSS 2% helps estimate near-term exploit likelihood; neither replaces asset context. Unknown fields should remain explicit in tickets, and threat actor, IOC, victimology, or payload claims should not be added unless a cited source supports them. Monitor CISA KEV, vendor advisories, NVD changes, public PoC repositories, and internal telemetry for update triggers.