What CVEs are caused by CWE-862?

6,792 recorded CVEs are attributed to CWE-862, including CVE-2022-0543, CVE-2025-6205, CVE-2025-20362. 8 are listed in CISA's Known Exploited Vulnerabilities (KEV) catalog.

What are the consequences of CWE-862?

Exploiting CWE-862 can lead to: Read Application Data, Read Files or Directories, Modify Application Data, Modify Files or Directories, Gain Privileges or Assume Identity, Bypass Protection Mechanism.

Is CWE-862 actively exploited?

Yes. 8 CWE-862 vulnerabilities are in CISA's KEV catalog of actively exploited flaws, out of 6,792 recorded CVEs.

Class weakness

Incomplete

CWE-862: Missing Authorization

Also known as: AuthZ

The product does not perform an authorization check when an actor attempts to access a resource or perform an action.

Last updated May 1, 2026

6,792

Recorded CVEs

With this primary weakness

KEVs

In the CISA KEV catalog

High

Likelihood of exploit

Per MITRE

Class

Abstraction

MITRE classification

Overview

CWE-862 (Missing Authorization) is a class-level software weakness catalogued by MITRE in the Common Weakness Enumeration (CWE). It describes a recurring type of mistake that can lead to exploitable security vulnerabilities.

Background

An access control list (ACL) represents who/what has permissions to a given object. Different operating systems implement (ACLs) in different ways. In UNIX, there are three types of permissions: read, write, and execute. Users are divided into three classes for file access: owner, group owner, and all other users where each class has a separate set of rights. In Windows NT, there are four basic types of permissions for files: "No access", "Read access", "Change access", and "Full control". Windows NT extends the concept of three types of users in UNIX to include a list of users and groups along with their associated permissions. A user can create an object (file) and assign specified permissions to that object.

Real-world CVEs

6,792 recorded CVEs are caused by CWE-862 (Missing Authorization), including 8 in CISA's KEV (Known Exploited Vulnerabilities) catalog. KEVs are shown first. 1,966 new CWE-862 CVEs have been recorded so far in 2026 (2,231 in 2025).

Showing 12 of 6,792 recorded CWE-862 CVEs. Track new ones as they are published and get AI-written analysis and fixes.

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Common consequences

What can happen when CWE-862 is exploited.

Read Application Data, Read Files or Directories

Affects: Confidentiality

An attacker could read sensitive data, either by reading the data directly from a data store that is not restricted, or by accessing insufficiently-protected, privileged functionality to read the data.

Modify Application Data, Modify Files or Directories

Affects: Integrity

An attacker could modify sensitive data, either by writing the data directly to a data store that is not restricted, or by accessing insufficiently-protected, privileged functionality to write the data.

Gain Privileges or Assume Identity, Bypass Protection Mechanism

Affects: Access Control

An attacker could gain privileges by modifying or reading critical data directly, or by accessing privileged functionality.

DoS: Crash, Exit, or Restart, DoS: Resource Consumption (CPU), DoS: Resource Consumption (Memory), DoS: Resource Consumption (Other)

Affects: Availability

An attacker could gain unauthorized access to resources on the system and excessively consume those resources, leading to a denial of service.

How it happens

When it is introduced

Typically introduced during these phases of the software lifecycle.

Architecture and Design

Implementation

Operation

Applies to

Technologies

AI/ML (Often)

Web Server (Often)

Database Server (Often)

How to prevent it

Practical mitigations for CWE-862, grouped by where in the lifecycle they apply.

Architecture and Design

Divide the product into anonymous, normal, privileged, and administrative areas. Reduce the attack surface by carefully mapping roles with data and functionality. Use role-based access control (RBAC) [REF-229] to enforce the roles at the appropriate boundaries.

Note that this approach may not protect against horizontal authorization, i.e., it will not protect a user from attacking others with the same role.

Architecture and Design

Ensure that access control checks are performed related to the business logic. These checks may be different than the access control checks that are applied to more generic resources such as files, connections, processes, memory, and database records. For example, a database may restrict access for medical records to a specific database user, but each record might only be intended to be accessible to the patient and the patient's doctor [REF-7].

Architecture and Design

Libraries or Frameworks

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 authorization frameworks such as the JAAS Authorization Framework [REF-233] and the OWASP ESAPI Access Control feature [REF-45].

Architecture and Design

For web applications, make sure that the access control mechanism is enforced correctly at the server side on every page. Users should not be able to access any unauthorized functionality or information by simply requesting direct access to that page.

One way to do this is to ensure that all pages containing sensitive information are not cached, and that all such pages restrict access to requests that are accompanied by an active and authenticated session token associated with a user who has the required permissions to access that page.

System Configuration

Installation

Use the access control capabilities of your operating system and server environment and define your access control lists accordingly. Use a "default deny" policy when defining these ACLs.

How to detect it

Automated Static Analysis

Automated static analysis is useful for detecting commonly-used idioms for authorization. A tool may be able to analyze related configuration files, such as .htaccess in Apache web servers, or detect the usage of commonly-used authorization libraries.

Generally, automated static analysis tools have difficulty detecting custom authorization schemes. In addition, the software's design may include some functionality that is accessible to any user and does not require an authorization check; an automated technique that detects the absence of authorization may report false positives.

Effectiveness: Limited

Automated Dynamic Analysis

Automated dynamic analysis may find many or all possible interfaces that do not require authorization, but manual analysis is required to determine if the lack of authorization violates business logic.

Manual Analysis

This weakness can be detected using tools and techniques that require manual (human) analysis, such as penetration testing, threat modeling, and interactive tools that allow the tester to record and modify an active session.

Specifically, manual static analysis is useful for evaluating the correctness of custom authorization mechanisms.

Effectiveness: Moderate