CVE-2014-1812: Microsoft Windows Group Policy Preferences Password Privilege Escalation Vulnerability

High severity, CVSS 8.8. Actively exploited: in CISA KEV since 2021-11-03. EPSS: 64.9% chance of exploitation in the next 30 days.

The Group Policy implementation in Microsoft Windows Vista SP2, Windows Server 2008 SP2 and R2 SP1, Windows 7 SP1, Windows 8, Windows 8.1, and Windows Server 2012 Gold and R2 does not properly handle distribution of passwords, which allows remote authenticated users to obtain sensitive credential information and consequently gain privileges by leveraging access to the SYSVOL share, as exploited in the wild in May 2014, aka "Group Policy Preferences Password Elevation of Privilege Vulnerability."

Affected products

• Microsoft Windows 7: affected versions not specified
• Microsoft Windows 8: affected versions not specified
• Microsoft Windows 8.1: affected versions not specified
• Microsoft Windows Server 2008: affected versions not specified; version r2 only
• Microsoft Windows Server 2012: affected versions not specified; version r2 only
• Microsoft Windows Vista: affected versions not specified

Published 2014-05-14. Last modified 2026-06-17.