CVE-2025-20138: Cisco IOS XR

High severity, CVSS 8.8. EPSS: 0.2% chance of exploitation in the next 30 days.

A vulnerability in the CLI of Cisco IOS XR Software could allow an authenticated, local attacker to execute arbitrary commands as root on the underlying operating system of an affected device. This vulnerability is due to insufficient validation of user arguments that are passed to specific CLI commands. An attacker with a low-privileged account could exploit this vulnerability by using crafted commands at the prompt. A successful exploit could allow the attacker to elevate privileges to root and execute arbitrary commands.

Affected products

• Cisco IOS XR: before 24.2.21 (fixed in 24.2.21); from 24.3, before 24.4 (fixed in 24.4)

Published 2025-03-12. Last modified 2026-06-17.