Threats / Microsoft / CVE-2014-1812
CVE-2014-1812
· EUVD no mirror located
· GCVE no mirror located
Verified 2026-09-19
Microsoft Windows vulnerability
Microsoft Windows Active Directory privilege escalation via Group Policy Preferences password distribution. Authenticated attackers can decrypt stored passwords to elevate domain privileges.
Verdict
Today item, not a backlog item.
Authenticated attackers exploit weak password encryption in Group Policy Preferences to recover credentials and escalate privileges across Active Directory domains. The vulnerability enables lateral movement and persistent access with elevated rights.
CISA KEV Yes · 2021-11-034Ransomware use Flagged4EPSS 0.64876 (verify live)5CVSS 8.8 (CISA)3CISA SSVC Exploitation: active · Automatable: no · Impact: partial3Exploit Public PoC / detection · Metasploit module11
01
Is it exploitable?
— the evidence, ranked above the scoreReported exploitation
5 independent public reports of in-the-wild exploitation are cataloged.Distinct reporting sources (vendor, incident response, government); open them for the underlying claims.
Exploited in the wild
Listed in the CISA Known Exploited Vulnerabilities catalog (added 2021-11-03), flagged for known ransomware use.
Probability (EPSS)
EPSS 0.64876 — modeled likelihood of exploitation activity.EPSS is a daily-changing model output — open the source for today's value.
Severity / affected
CVSS 8.8 (CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:H) · Affected: Microsoft, Windows. Confirm exact fixed builds in the vendor advisory.CVSS — CISA-assigned via the ADP container (CVE.org), version 3.1; the CNA left no metrics, so CISA's own score is used ahead of NVD.
Weakness (CWE)
Mapped to CWE-255 CWE-255 — weakness family: Authentication.CWE assignment from the public NVD record (may be stale); the weakness class drives how the flaw is exploited.
CISA SSVC (triage disposition)
Exploitation: active · Automatable: no · Technical Impact: partialCISA's own stakeholder-specific triage inputs, published in the CVE record (CISA Coordinator role). NOTE: this is CISA's three decision points; the final Act/Attend/Track decision also requires a Mission & Well-being input not published here, so no overall decision is asserted.
Currency of the record
CISA added this to its KEV catalog 2730 days after the CVE record was published.KEV lag = CISA-KEV dateAdded − CVE.org datePublished; a floor on how long the known-exploited flaw sat in the public record before the federal catalog listed it. Severity/weakness here is CNA- or CISA-assigned (current at disclosure), independent of NVD's analysis backlog.
Public exploit available
Public exploit tooling is catalogued for this CVE (a public proof-of-concept / detection template). Catalog entries: Metasploit module. We link the catalog page(s) only — no payload or code is hosted or restated here.Link, never host — the catalog page is the source; basicsecurity.net does not redistribute payloads.
02
Who’s exploiting it?
— attribution turns risk into urgencyAttribution not established
No confirmed (advisory-backed) threat-actor attribution is established for this record. Absence of a named actor is not absence of compromise — see Coverage & confidence.
03
Why it matters
— the attack path, told twice: adversary, then board1
Front door — unauthenticated access narrative 1
Attacker
I authenticate to the domain as a standard user and locate Group Policy Preference files containing encrypted passwords.
Business
Insider threats and compromised user accounts become vectors for domain-wide privilege escalation.
2
Keys to the kingdom — privilege/identity takeover narrative 2
Attacker
I decrypt the stored passwords using publicly available tools that reverse the weak encryption scheme.
Business
Administrative credentials are exposed, enabling attackers to assume control of critical infrastructure.
3
Lateral reach — past segmentation narrative 3
Attacker
I use the recovered credentials to access higher-privileged accounts and systems across the domain.
Business
Attackers gain administrative access to deploy malware, ransomware, and establish persistence.
4
Data at risk — exfiltration narrative 4
Attacker
I move laterally through the network using elevated privileges to compromise additional systems and data.
Business
Widespread system compromise enables data exfiltration, encryption attacks, and operational disruption.
04
What to do
— defensible action- Remediate per the vendor advisory — confirm the fixed build for your version and verify exposure.1
Say it to the boardA vulnerability with this evidence profile is a defensible budget line, not a backlog ticket — fund the change against the proof above.
05
Coverage & confidence
— what we know, and what we don’tEstablished (cited)
Coverage gaps — stated, not hidden
Disclosure & credit2
Catalogued by microsoftCNA
Credited with finding itNo finder is named in the public CVE record or the scanned vendor advisory — attribution scoped to the sources checked.
Found an error? Propose a correction.
A correction is a cited counter-claim — it must cite a source,
gets reviewed by a second human, and is never auto-applied. See the
correction convention and our identity
npub1j7gt9ky7sfcrjn8jjee6693dkzvk4rahs0fk2suu7968dfns62zs3mqm3y.