What is CVE-2026-76461?

CVE-2026-76461 is Cisco Secure Email Gateway SQL Injection Vulnerability. The supplied enrichment data classifies it as Injection mapped to CWE-89 SQL Injection.

Which versions are affected?

Affected product and version evidence is listed in the product table above. Current public advisories should be checked for exact version scope before patch targeting is finalized.

Is there active exploitation?

Yes: CISA KEV signal present. If exploitation is not confirmed from current sources, teams should document that status and continue monitoring KEV, vendor, and telemetry updates.

Is there a public exploit?

2 public PoC repositories reported; 0 marked weaponized in current dataset. Public exploit or PoC availability should raise triage priority, especially for exposed or business-critical systems.

How can defenders detect it?

Start with web/proxy/WAF logs, application logs, network IDS/IPS, database audit logs where available. Look for vulnerability-class behavior, product errors, suspicious authentication events, exploit probes, and abnormal process activity based only on evidence that applies to the affected product.

How should teams prioritize it?

Prioritize CVE-2026-76461 using CVSS 9.8, EPSS 0%, KEV status, public PoC status, and asset exposure. Internet-facing, privileged, or business-critical deployments should be handled first.

Are workarounds available?

The supplied mitigation guidance says to apply vendor patches and restrict external exposure until fixed. Fixed-version evidence is listed in the mitigation section above.

Which threat actors are linked publicly?

No public threat actor linkage is confirmed from current sources. Do not attribute exploitation to a threat actor unless the source evidence explicitly supports that linkage.

What should be done in the next 24 hours?

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. Open remediation tickets with affected assets, owners, evidence status, and detection coverage so decisions are traceable.

CISA KEVcriticalInjectionpublic exploit

CVE-2026-76461

CVE-2026-76461 — Cisco Secure Email Gateway SQL Injection Vulnerability

Q: Is it in CISA KEV?

Yes. The supplied enrichment data lists CVE-2026-76461 in CISA KEV with required action: Apply mitigations in accordance with vendor instructions, ensuring compliance with CISA’s BOD 26-04 Prioritizing Security Updates Based on Risk (see URL in Notes) guidance and CISA’s “Forensics Triage Requirements” (see URL in Notes). Follow applicable BOD 26-04 guidance for cloud services or discontinue use of the product if mitigations are unavailable. Stakeholders are responsible for evaluating each asset's internet exposure and ensuring adherence to BOD 26-04 patching guidelines.. KEV status should be monitored because it can change after initial disclosure or after exploitation becomes publicly confirmed.

A vulnerability in the email parsing of Cisco AsyncOS Software for Cisco Secure Email Gateway could allow an unauthenticated, remote attacker to execute arbitrary commands with root privileges on the underlying operating system. This vulnerability is due to insufficient validation in the email parsing logic. An attacker could exploit this vulnerability by sending a crafted email message that contains malicious SQL statements through an affected device. A successful exploit could allow the attacker to execute arbitrary SQL statements, leading to command execution with root privileges on the underlying operating system.

Published Sep 14, 2026Updated Sep 14, 2026Sources: NVD, Cisco (CNA), CISA, GitHub, GitHub Security Advisory, SOCRadar CTI

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 Sep 14, 2026

EPSS

ahead of 0% of scored CVEs

Affects

Cisco

23 products listed

CVSS base

9.8

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 Cisco Secure Email to a fixed release. Apply vendor patches per advisory and restrict external exposure of the affected component until patched.

CISA required action

Apply mitigations in accordance with vendor instructions, ensuring compliance with CISA’s BOD 26-04 Prioritizing Security Updates Based on Risk (see URL in Notes) guidance and CISA’s “Forensics Triage Requirements” (see URL in Notes). Follow applicable BOD 26-04 guidance for cloud services or discontinue use of the product if mitigations are unavailable. Stakeholders are responsible for evaluating each asset's internet exposure and ensuring adherence to BOD 26-04 patching guidelines.

Federal deadline Sep 17, 2026 — in 2 days

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.

Vendor	Product	Versions	Status
Cisco	Cisco Secure Email	14.0.0-698	Vulnerable
Cisco	Cisco Secure Email	13.5.1-277	Vulnerable
Cisco	Cisco Secure Email	13.0.0-392	Vulnerable
Cisco	Cisco Secure Email	14.2.0-620	Vulnerable
Cisco	Cisco Secure Email	13.0.5-007	Vulnerable
Cisco	Cisco Secure Email	13.5.4-038	Vulnerable
Cisco	Cisco Secure Email	14.2.1-020	Vulnerable
Cisco	Cisco Secure Email	14.3.0-032	Vulnerable
Cisco	Cisco Secure Email	15.0.0-104	Vulnerable
Cisco	Cisco Secure Email	15.0.1-030	Vulnerable
Cisco	Cisco Secure Email	15.5.0-048	Vulnerable
Cisco	Cisco Secure Email	15.5.1-055	Vulnerable

Attack characteristics

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

Availability

High

Confidentiality

High

Integrity

High

Scope

Unchanged

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.

Score	Version	Severity	Expl.	Impact	Source
9.8	CVSS 3.1	critical	3.9	5.9	Cisco (CNA), GHSA

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

What this weakness leads to

MITRE's own consequences and mitigations for the weakness class — the authority's wording, not guidance derived from the CVSS vector.

MITRE

CWE-89 · Improper Neutralization of Special Elements used in an SQL Command ('SQL Injection')

Read Application Data
Bypass Protection Mechanism
Modify Application Data

Mitigation: Use a vetted library or framework that does not allow this weakness to occur or provides constructs that make this weakness easier to avoid. For example, consider using persistence layers such as Hibernate or Enterprise Java Beans, which can provide significant protection against SQL injection if used properly.

Weakness & attack patterns

CWE-89SQL Injection

Attack patterns reported against this CVE. The ATT&CK techniques below are inferred from its weakness class.

CAPEC-470 · Expanding Control over the Operating System from the DatabaseCAPEC-7 · Blind SQL InjectionCAPEC-109 · Object Relational Mapping InjectionCAPEC-110 · SQL Injection through SOAP Parameter TamperingCAPEC-108 · Command Line Execution through SQL InjectionCAPEC-66 · SQL Injection

CISA KEV details

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

CISAThat month →

Listed

Sep 14, 2026

Federal deadline

Sep 17, 2026

in 2 days

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

Detection

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

Prioritize edge telemetry for network-reachable Cisco Secure Email.
Monitor for scanner or exploit-pattern traffic after 2 public PoC repositories were reported.

web/proxy/WAF logsapplication logsnetwork IDS/IPSdatabase audit logs

Timeline

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

2026
Added to CISA KEV catalog
Sep 14, 2026 · CISA
Added · CVSS 3.1 9.8 (AV:N)
Sep 14, 2026 · NVD
Initial · CVE published
Sep 14, 2026 · NVD
Added · GHSA-jwpf-jww6-h6vr published (critical)
Sep 14, 2026 · GitHub Security Advisory
CVE published by MITRE.
Sep 14, 2026 · SOCRadar CTI

References

6 on the record

sec.cloudapps.cisco.com/security/center/content/CiscoSecurityAdvisory/cisco-sa-esa-inj-2bLVGmhX
Vendor Advisory, Mitre, NIST
www.cisa.gov/known-exploited-vulnerabilities-catalog?field_cve=CVE-2026-76461
US Government Resource
nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2026-76461
NVD, Vendor Advisory
github.com/advisories/GHSA-jwpf-jww6-h6vr
Exploit, Third Party Advisory
www.cisa.gov/news-events/directives/bod-26-04-prioritizing-security-updates-based-risk
US Government Resource
www.cisa.gov/news-events/directives/bod-26-04-implementation-guidance-prioritizing-security-updates-based-risk
US Government Resource

Elsewhere on this site

Ciscoevery CVE for this vendor
September 2026what else CISA listed
Injectionsame class
CWE-89other pages naming this weakness

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-2026-76461 is Cisco Secure Email Gateway SQL Injection Vulnerability, a critical vulnerability affecting Cisco Secure Email from Cisco. 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 9.8 describes technical severity, while EPSS 0% 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.