CVE-2025-20206
Cisco Secure Client for Windows with VPN Posture (HostScan) Module DLL Hijacking Vulnerability
- Published
- Updated
- Reserved
- Assigned by
- cisco
Description
A vulnerability in the interprocess communication (IPC) channel of Cisco Secure Client for Windows could allow an authenticated, local attacker to perform a DLL hijacking attack on an affected device if the Secure Firewall Posture Engine, formerly HostScan, is installed on Cisco Secure Client. This vulnerability is due to insufficient validation of resources that are loaded by the application at run time. An attacker could exploit this vulnerability by sending a crafted IPC message to a specific Cisco Secure Client process. A successful exploit could allow the attacker to execute arbitrary code on the affected machine with SYSTEM privileges. To exploit this vulnerability, the attacker must have valid user credentials on the Windows system.
Scores
| Scored by | CVSS | Score | Vector |
|---|---|---|---|
| ciscoCNA (assigner) | 3.1 | High7.1 | CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:N |
| NVDNVD · Analyzed | 3.1 | High7.8 | CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:H |
- EPSS (exploitation in 30 days)
- 0.18% · top 93% of all CVEs (7 Nov 2026)
- CISA SSVC
- Exploitation: none · Automatable: no · Technical impact: total
The list uses the assigner's score when there is one, then CISA's, then NVD's: High 7.1.
Weakness
Affected products
- affected 4.9.00086
- affected 4.9.01095
- affected 4.9.02028
- affected 4.9.03047
- affected 4.9.03049
- affected 4.9.04043
- affected 4.9.04053
- affected 4.9.05042
- affected 4.9.06037
- affected 4.10.00093
- affected 4.10.01075
- affected 4.10.02086
- affected 4.10.03104
- affected 4.10.04065
- affected 4.10.04071
- affected 4.10.05085
- affected 4.10.05095
- affected 5.0.00238
- affected 4.10.05111
- affected 5.0.00529
- affected 5.0.00556
- affected 4.10.06079
- affected 5.0.01242
- affected 4.10.06090
- affected 5.0.02075
- affected 4.10.07061
- affected 5.0.03072
- affected 4.10.07062
- affected 5.0.03076
- affected 5.0.04032
- affected 4.10.07073
- affected 5.0.05040
- affected 5.1.0.136
- affected 5.1.1.42
- affected 4.10.08025
- affected 5.1.2.42
- affected 4.10.08029
- affected 5.1.3.62
- affected 5.1.4.74
- affected 5.1.5.65
- and 2 more
What to do
Exploitation: The Cisco PSIRT is not aware of any public announcements or malicious use of the vulnerability that is described in this advisory.
References (1)
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)
- 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
[](https://trackcve.app/cve/CVE-2025-20206)Record last updated .