# CVE-2026-32603: Sandboxie kernel driver denial of service via malformed IOCTL from sandboxed process

> A local attacker in a Standard Sandbox can crash the Windows kernel via malformed IOCTL, causing a Blue Screen of Death.

- **Severity:** High 8.2 (`CVSS:4.0/AV:L/AC:L/AT:N/PR:L/UI:N/VC:N/VI:N/VA:H/SC:N/SI:N/SA:H`)
- **Exploited in the wild:** Not known
- **Login needed:** Any signed-in user
- **Attackable:** Local or same network only
- **Victim action needed:** Not needed
- **Fix available:** No
- **Published:** 5 May 2026
- **Updated:** 6 May 2026
- **Also known as:** GHSA-vvf8-cf4j-v8fv

## What is CVE-2026-32603?

CVE-2026-32603 is a high-severity denial of service vulnerability in sandboxie-plus Sandboxie, published on 5 May 2026. It can only be exploited from the same machine or local network, with no action from the victim.

### Official description

Sandboxie is an open source sandbox-based isolation software for Windows. In versions 1.17.2 and earlier, a local denial of service vulnerability exists in the Sandboxie kernel driver. An unprivileged process running inside a Standard Sandbox can send a malformed IOCTL to the \Device\SandboxieDriverApi driver, triggering an immediate kernel crash (BSOD). The vulnerability affects the Standard Sandbox configuration both with and without dropped administrator privileges, but does not affect the Security Hardened Sandbox configuration. This issue has been fixed in version 1.17.3. Users who cannot update can use the Security Hardened Sandbox configuration as a workaround.

Weakness: CWE-20 (Improper Input Validation)

## Which versions are affected by CVE-2026-32603?

It affects 1 product.


Products: Sandboxie-Plus Sandboxie.

## How do I fix CVE-2026-32603?

No fix has been published for CVE-2026-32603 yet. Limit exposure of the affected software until one is available.

## Is CVE-2026-32603 being exploited?

It is not confirmed as exploited in the wild, but public exploit code for CVE-2026-32603 exists.

## Other vulnerabilities in sandboxie-plus Sandboxie

- [CVE-2018-18748](https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2018-18748/): Security feature bypass in n/a (critical 10.0)
- [CVE-2025-64721](https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2025-64721/): Sandboxie's Integer Overflow in SbieIniServer::RC4Crypt allows sandbox escape and SYSTEM compromise (critical 9.9)
- [CVE-2026-34458](https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2026-34458/): Sandboxie-Plus privilege escalation via INI CRLF injection bypassing EditAdminOnly (critical 9.3)
- [CVE-2024-49360](https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2024-49360/): Path traversal in Sandboxie (critical 9.2)
- [CVE-2026-34459](https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2026-34459/): Sandboxie-Plus sandbox escape via uninitialized memory leak and stack overflow in GetRawInputDeviceInfoSlave (high 8.8)

## Fix prompt for AI coding agents

```text
Check this codebase for CVE-2026-32603 and fix it if it is affected.

What it is: CVE-2026-32603 is a high-severity denial of service vulnerability in sandboxie-plus Sandboxie, published on 5 May 2026. It can only be exploited from the same machine or local network, with no action from the victim.
Exploitation: It is not confirmed as exploited in the wild, but public exploit code for CVE-2026-32603 exists.

Affected product: sandboxie-plus Sandboxie. No package-level version data is available, so check the vendor advisory linked from the reference page.

Task:
1. Search the dependency manifests and lockfiles (for example package.json, package-lock.json, requirements.txt, poetry.lock, uv.lock, pom.xml, build.gradle, go.mod, Cargo.lock, Gemfile.lock) and any Dockerfiles for the affected packages, including transitive dependencies.
2. If an affected version is in use, upgrade it to the fixed version for its release line with the project's package manager, so the lockfile is regenerated. Prefer the smallest upgrade that fixes it.
3. If there is no fix, or the upgrade would break the build, do not guess: explain the risk and the safest workaround instead.
4. Run the tests and summarise what changed and why.
5. If nothing in the project is affected, say so and change nothing.

Reference: https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2026-32603/ (Markdown: https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2026-32603/index.md)
```

## Sources

- CVE record: https://www.cve.org/CVERecord?id=CVE-2026-32603
- NVD: https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2026-32603
- OSV: https://osv.dev/vulnerability/CVE-2026-32603

---
From sbomify Insights: https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2026-32603/
Summaries are generated and may contain mistakes; the official description above is the record.