Cisco APIC: Improper access control in hardening release
Summary
Cisco Application Policy Infrastructure Controller (APIC), the controller for Cisco ACI data-centre fabrics, contains an improper access control vulnerability (CWE-284) found during an internal security review. Cisco rates it 9.8 (Critical) and states that it affects APIC regardless of device configuration. The advisory does not clearly state whether authentication is required, so the exact attack conditions are not confirmed; the CVSS vector describes network access without privileges or user interaction. No workaround is available.
Affected
- Cisco APIC 5.2(1g), 5.2(2e), 5.2(2f), 5.2(2g), 5.2(2h), 5.2(3e), 5.2(3f), 5.2(3g), 5.2(4d), 5.2(4e), 5.2(5c), 5.2(5d) (per CVE record)
- Cisco APIC 5.3 and earlier: migrate to a fixed release
Fixed in
- Cisco APIC 6.0: 6.0(9h)
- Cisco APIC 6.1: 6.1(6g)
- Cisco APIC 6.2: 6.2(3g)
- Cisco APIC 5.3 and earlier: migrate to a fixed release
Workaround
No workarounds available according to Cisco. Restricting management access to trusted networks reduces exposure while patching.
Exploitation
- Cisco PSIRT is not aware of any public announcements or malicious use.
- CISA SSVC assessment: exploitation none, automatable yes, technical impact total.
- No CISA KEV listing found at the time of research.
Our recommendation
- Check whether Cisco APIC is in use; if not, no action is needed.
- Where APIC is in use, upgrade to a fixed release with the highest priority.
- Remove any internet exposure of APIC management interfaces and restrict access to trusted administrator networks.
- Monitor APIC logs for unusual access and verify the fixed releases in Cisco's advisory before rollout.
Public exploits
PoC-in-GitHub, Metasploit and Exploit-DB list nothing for this CVE.
Research sources
- Cisco Security Advisory cisco-sa-hardening-apic-UOXWtfh sec.cloudapps.cisco.com
- Vulners VulnRichment CVE-2026-76498 vulners.com
- OpenCVE CVE-2026-76498 app.opencve.io
- Tenable Nessus plugin 364489 www.tenable.com
- SecureISS summary of Cisco October 2026 advisories www.secure-iss.com
- vuln.management CVE-2026-76500 Cisco APIC summary vuln.management
Researched and written up in English and German by an AI (Claude by Anthropic) based on NVD, CISA, EPSS and the sources listed. The vendor information is authoritative. Researched on 30 Oct 2026, 20:42.
Original description (NVD)
As part of Cisco's ongoing commitment to proactive security and product quality, the Cisco Application Policy Infrastructure Controller (APIC) engineering team has conducted a comprehensive internal security review. This review resulted in software hardening releases that address multiple internally discovered vulnerabilities. The vulnerabilities tracked by CVE-2026-76498 are related to improper access control issues that are grouped under the Common Weakness Enumeration (CWE) Pillar CWE-284.
Sources
The tracker combines official, freely usable data sources – updated continuously:
- NVD (NIST) – CVEs, rating (CVSS), affected products
- CISA KEV – vulnerabilities confirmed by CISA as actively exploited
- CISA Vulnrichment – CISA assessment (SSVC) in the official CVE record
- FIRST EPSS – probability of exploitation
- Microsoft MSRC – Patch Tuesday: vulnerabilities, severity, updates
- PoC-in-GitHub – public proof-of-concept repositories
- Metasploit (Rapid7) – modules of the Metasploit Framework
- Exploit-DB (OffSec) – archive of public exploits (links only)
- Patch days: official vendor pages (linked per vendor) (Vendor patch days)
This product uses data from the NVD API but is not endorsed or certified by the NVD. EPSS data © FIRST.org.
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