CVE-2026-21981 Privilege escalation in Oracle VM VirtualBox

Medium 4.6 Published 20 Jan 2026 Updated 21 Jan 2026

A high-privileged attacker can exploit a flaw in Oracle VM VirtualBox to read sensitive data and cause partial denial of service.

Exploited in the wild: Not known
Login needed: An administrator
Attackable: Local or same network only
Victim action needed: Not needed
Fix: None listed

What is CVE-2026-21981?

CVE-2026-21981 is a medium-severity vulnerability in Oracle Vm Virtualbox, published on 20 Jan 2026. It can only be exploited from the same machine or local network, with no action from the victim.

Official description

Vulnerability in the Oracle VM VirtualBox product of Oracle Virtualization (component: Core). Supported versions that are affected are 7.1.14 and 7.2.4. Easily exploitable vulnerability allows high privileged attacker with logon to the infrastructure where Oracle VM VirtualBox executes to compromise Oracle VM VirtualBox. While the vulnerability is in Oracle VM VirtualBox, attacks may significantly impact additional products (scope change). Successful attacks of this vulnerability can result in unauthorized read access to a subset of Oracle VM VirtualBox accessible data and unauthorized ability to cause a partial denial of service (partial DOS) of Oracle VM VirtualBox. CVSS 3.1 Base Score 4.6 (Confidentiality and Availability impacts). CVSS Vector: (CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:L/PR:H/UI:N/S:C/C:L/I:N/A:L).

Weakness: CWE-269

Which versions are affected by CVE-2026-21981?

It affects 1 product.

Products include Oracle Vm Virtualbox.

How do I fix CVE-2026-21981?

No fix has been published for CVE-2026-21981 yet. Limit exposure of the affected software until one is available.

Is CVE-2026-21981 being exploited?

There is no known exploitation of CVE-2026-21981 in the wild and no public exploit code.

All Oracle Vm Virtualbox vulnerabilities

Sources

Also known as GHSA-4r4q-4mqv-pv27, UBUNTU-CVE-2026-21981.