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Vulnerability record · CVE-2020-7014 · published 3 June 2020

CVE-2020-7014: Elasticsearch improper privilege management vulnerability

Elastic · Elasticsearch

The fix for CVE-2020-7009 was found to be incomplete. Elasticsearch versions from 6.7.0 to 6.8.7 and 7.0.0 to 7.6.1 contain a privilege escalation flaw if an attacker is able to create API keys and also authentication tokens. An attacker who is able to generate an API key and an authentication token can perform a series of steps that result in an authentication token being generated with elevated privileges.

8.8 CVSS 3.1 High EPSS 1.5% · top 26.1% CWE-266 · CWE-266CWE-269 · Improper privilege management
8.8CVSS 3.1 base score, v2 6.5
1.5%EPSS exploitation probability, 30 days
NoNot in CISA KEV
1Affected product versions listed by NVD
4References
17 Jun 2026Last modified by NVD

Description

The fix for CVE-2020-7009 was found to be incomplete. Elasticsearch versions from 6.7.0 to 6.8.7 and 7.0.0 to 7.6.1 contain a privilege escalation flaw if an attacker is able to create API keys and also authentication tokens. An attacker who is able to generate an API key and an authentication token can perform a series of steps that result in an authentication token being generated with elevated privileges.

CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:H

Affected products

1 vulnerable configurations from NVD's CPE data, grouped by vendor and product.

References

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Related vulnerabilities

Same products first, then exploited flaws of the same weakness class.

9.8CVE-2015-1427Elasticsearch Groovy scripting engine sandbox escape RCEThe Groovy scripting engine in Elasticsearch before 1.3.8 and 1.4.x before 1.4.3 fails to enforce its sandbox, letting a crafted script execute arbit…KEVEPSS 100%analysed8.1CVE-2014-3120Elasticsearch dynamic scripting allows remote code executionThe default configuration in Elasticsearch before 1.2 enables dynamic scripting, so the source parameter to _search can execute arbitrary MVEL expres…KEVEPSS 89%analysed9.8CVE-2015-5377Elasticsearch injection vulnerabilityElasticsearch before 1.6.1 allows remote attackers to execute arbitrary code via unspecified vectors involving the transport protocol. NOTE: ZDI appe…EPSS 14%8.8CVE-2026-72649Elasticsearch deserialization of untrusted data vulnerabilityDeserialization of Untrusted Data (CWE-502) in the Elasticsearch machine learning component can lead to remote code execution via Object Injection (C…EPSS 0.92%8.8CVE-2026-72642Elasticsearch vulnerabilityThe native inference process that Elasticsearch uses to evaluate uploaded machine learning models accepts a model operation that computes a memory ad…EPSS 0.60%8.8CVE-2021-37937Elasticsearch improper privilege management vulnerabilityAn issue was found with how API keys are created with the Fleet-Server service account. When an API key is created with a service account, it is poss…EPSS 0.71%8.8CVE-2020-7009Elasticsearch improper privilege management vulnerabilityElasticsearch versions from 6.7.0 before 6.8.8 and 7.0.0 before 7.6.2 contain a privilege escalation flaw if an attacker is able to create API keys. …EPSS 1.6%8.8CVE-2018-3831Elasticsearch information exposure vulnerabilityElasticsearch Alerting and Monitoring in versions before 6.4.1 or 5.6.12 have an information disclosure issue when secrets are configured via the API…EPSS 2.0%

Source: NIST National Vulnerability Database (record CVE-2020-7014), CISA KEV, FIRST EPSS (scores of 2026-09-26). This page is refreshed as NVD updates the record.