Threats / Red Hat / CVE-2021-3560
CVE-2021-3560
· EUVD no mirror located
· GCVE no mirror located
Verified 2026-06-22
Red Hat Polkit vulnerability
Red Hat Polkit contains an authorization bypass vulnerability in D-Bus credential checking that allows privilege escalation.
Verdict
Today item — known-exploited.
An unauthenticated local attacker can bypass Polkit's credential validation on D-Bus requests to gain elevated privileges. The vulnerability has been exploited in the wild but is not associated with ransomware campaigns.
01
Is it exploitable?
— the evidence, ranked above the scoreExploit available
Public proof-of-concept exploit code is cataloged for this vulnerability.We link the existence of the exploit; we do not host or redistribute payloads.
Reported exploitation
1 independent public report of in-the-wild exploitation are cataloged.Distinct reporting sources (vendor, incident response, government); open them for the underlying claims.
Exploited in the wild
Listed in the CISA Known Exploited Vulnerabilities catalog (added 2023-05-12).
Probability (EPSS)
EPSS 0.22193 — modeled likelihood of exploitation activity.EPSS is a daily-changing model output — open the source for today's value.
Severity / affected
Affected: Red Hat, Polkit. Confirm exact fixed builds in the vendor advisory.
Weakness (CWE)
Mapped to CWE-863 Incorrect Authorization — weakness family: Authorization / access control.CWE assignment from the public NVD record; the weakness class drives how the flaw is exploited.
02
Who’s exploiting it?
— attribution turns risk into urgencyAttribution not established
No confirmed (advisory-backed) threat-actor attribution is established for this record. Absence of a named actor is not absence of compromise — see Coverage & confidence.
03
Why it matters
— the attack path, told twice: adversary, then board1
Front door — unauthenticated access narrative 1
Attacker
I craft a D-Bus request that exploits the credential check bypass in Polkit.
Business
An unprivileged user gains unauthorized administrative access to the system.
2
Keys to the kingdom — privilege/identity takeover narrative 2
Attacker
I use elevated privileges to modify system configuration, install malware, or access sensitive data.
Business
System integrity is compromised, exposing the organization to data theft, service disruption, and compliance violations.
04
What to do
— defensible action- Remediate per the vendor advisory — confirm the fixed build for your version and verify exposure.1
Say it to the boardA vulnerability with this evidence profile is a defensible budget line, not a backlog ticket — fund the change against the proof above.
05