Netlogon Elevation of Privilege Vulnerability

Description

An elevation of privilege vulnerability exists when an attacker establishes a vulnerable Netlogon secure channel connection to a domain controller, using the Netlogon Remote Protocol (MS-NRPC). An attacker who successfully exploited the vulnerability could run a specially crafted application on a device on the network. To exploit the vulnerability, an unauthenticated attacker would be required to use MS-NRPC to connect to a domain controller to obtain domain administrator access. Microsoft is addressing the vulnerability in a phased two-part rollout. These updates address the vulnerability by modifying how Netlogon handles the usage of Netlogon secure channels. For guidelines on how to manage the changes required for this vulnerability and more information on the phased rollout, see How to manage the changes in Netlogon secure channel connections associated with CVE-2020-1472 (updated September 28, 2020). When the second phase of Windows updates become available in Q1 2021, customers will be notified via a revision to this security vulnerability. If you wish to be notified when these updates are released, we recommend that you register for the security notifications mailer to be alerted of content changes to this advisory. See Microsoft Technical Security Notifications.

Scores

EPSS (exploitation in 30 days)

99.4% · top 0.1% of all CVEs (7 Nov 2026)

CISA SSVC

Exploitation: active · Automatable: yes · Technical impact: total

The list uses the assigner's score when there is one, then CISA's, then NVD's: Medium 5.5.

Weakness

• Elevation of Privilege
• CWE-noinfo Not enough information

Affected products

• Microsoft · Windows Server version 2004

  • affected 10.0.0 – < publication

• Microsoft · Windows Server 2019

  • affected 10.0.0 – < publication

• Microsoft · Windows Server 2019 (Server Core installation)

  • affected 10.0.0 – < publication

• Microsoft · Windows Server, version 1909 (Server Core installation)

  • affected 10.0.0 – < publication

• Microsoft · Windows Server, version 1903 (Server Core installation)

  • affected 10.0.0 – < publication

• Microsoft · Windows Server 2016

  • affected 10.0.0 – < publication

• Microsoft · Windows Server 2016 (Server Core installation)

  • affected 10.0.0 – < publication

• Microsoft · Windows Server 2008 R2 Service Pack 1

  • affected 6.1.0 – < publication

• Microsoft · Windows Server 2008 R2 Service Pack 1 (Server Core installation)

  • affected 6.0.0 – < publication

• Microsoft · Windows Server 2012

  • affected 6.2.0 – < publication

• Microsoft · Windows Server 2012 (Server Core installation)

  • affected 6.2.0 – < publication

• Microsoft · Windows Server 2012 R2

  • affected 6.3.0 – < publication

• Microsoft · Windows Server 2012 R2 (Server Core installation)

  • affected 6.3.0 – < publication

• Microsoft · Windows Server version 20H2

  • affected 10.0.0 – < publication

References (18)

• https://portal.msrc.microsoft.com/en-US/security-guidance/advisory/CVE-2020-1472 (opens in a new tab)x_refsource_MISCx_transferred
• VU#490028 (opens in a new tab)third-party-advisoryx_refsource_CERT-VNx_transferred
• [oss-security] 20200917 Samba and CVE-2020-1472 ("Zerologon") (opens in a new tab)mailing-listx_refsource_MLISTx_transferred
• USN-4510-1 (opens in a new tab)vendor-advisoryx_refsource_UBUNTUx_transferred
• USN-4510-2 (opens in a new tab)vendor-advisoryx_refsource_UBUNTUx_transferred
• FEDORA-2020-0be2776ed3 (opens in a new tab)vendor-advisoryx_refsource_FEDORAx_transferred
• openSUSE-SU-2020:1513 (opens in a new tab)vendor-advisoryx_refsource_SUSEx_transferred
• openSUSE-SU-2020:1526 (opens in a new tab)vendor-advisoryx_refsource_SUSEx_transferred
• FEDORA-2020-77c15664b0 (opens in a new tab)vendor-advisoryx_refsource_FEDORAx_transferred
• FEDORA-2020-a1d139381a (opens in a new tab)vendor-advisoryx_refsource_FEDORAx_transferred
• USN-4559-1 (opens in a new tab)vendor-advisoryx_refsource_UBUNTUx_transferred
• [debian-lts-announce] 20201123 [SECURITY] [DLA 2463-1] samba security update (opens in a new tab)mailing-listx_refsource_MLISTx_transferred
• GLSA-202012-24 (opens in a new tab)vendor-advisoryx_refsource_GENTOOx_transferred
• https://www.oracle.com/security-alerts/cpuApr2021.html (opens in a new tab)x_refsource_MISCx_transferred
• http://packetstormsecurity.com/files/159190/Zerologon-Proof-Of-Concept.html (opens in a new tab)x_refsource_MISCx_transferred
• https://www.synology.com/security/advisory/Synology_SA_20_21 (opens in a new tab)x_refsource_CONFIRMx_transferred
• http://packetstormsecurity.com/files/160127/Zerologon-Netlogon-Privilege-Escalation.html (opens in a new tab)x_refsource_MISCx_transferred
• https://www.cisa.gov/known-exploited-vulnerabilities-catalog?field_cve=CVE-2020-1472 (opens in a new tab)government-resource

Sources

The same CVE in the primary databases and aggregators, to check against.

• CVE.org record (opens in a new tab)
• CVE List JSON (GitHub) (opens in a new tab)
• NVD (opens in a new tab)
• CISA KEV catalog (opens in a new tab)
• FIRST EPSS (opens in a new tab)
• OSV.dev (opens in a new tab)
• GitHub Advisories (opens in a new tab)
• CIRCL Vulnerability-Lookup (opens in a new tab)

Badge for a README or a ticket

[![CVE-2020-1472](https://trackcve.app/badge/CVE-2020-1472.svg)](https://trackcve.app/cve/CVE-2020-1472)

Record last updated 21 Oct 2025, 23:35 UTC.