Microsoft Edge Elevation Service exposes a privileged COM interface that inadequately validates the privileges of the calling process. A standard (non‑administrator) local user can invoke the IElevatorEdge interface method LaunchUpdateCmdElevatedAndWait, causing the service to execute privileged update commands as LocalSystem.
This allows a non‑administrator to enable or disable Windows Virtualization‑Based Security (VBS) by modifying protected system registry keys under HKLM\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\DeviceGuard. Disabling VBS weakens critical platform protections such as Credential Guard, Hypervisor‑protected Code Integrity (HVCI), and the Secure Kernel, resulting in a security feature bypass.
Advisories

No advisories yet.

Fixes

Solution

No solution given by the vendor.


Workaround

No workaround given by the vendor.

History

Fri, 16 Jan 2026 22:15:00 +0000

Type Values Removed Values Added
Metrics cvssV3_1

{'score': 5.1, 'vector': 'CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:L/I:L/A:N'}

ssvc

{'options': {'Automatable': 'no', 'Exploitation': 'none', 'Technical Impact': 'partial'}, 'version': '2.0.3'}


Fri, 16 Jan 2026 21:45:00 +0000

Type Values Removed Values Added
Description Microsoft Edge Elevation Service exposes a privileged COM interface that inadequately validates the privileges of the calling process. A standard (non‑administrator) local user can invoke the IElevatorEdge interface method LaunchUpdateCmdElevatedAndWait, causing the service to execute privileged update commands as LocalSystem. This allows a non‑administrator to enable or disable Windows Virtualization‑Based Security (VBS) by modifying protected system registry keys under HKLM\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\DeviceGuard. Disabling VBS weakens critical platform protections such as Credential Guard, Hypervisor‑protected Code Integrity (HVCI), and the Secure Kernel, resulting in a security feature bypass.
Title Microsoft Edge (Chromium-based) Security Feature Bypass Vulnerability
First Time appeared Microsoft
Microsoft edge Chromium
Weaknesses CWE-269
CPEs cpe:2.3:a:microsoft:edge_chromium:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*
Vendors & Products Microsoft
Microsoft edge Chromium
References

Projects

Sign in to view the affected projects.

cve-icon MITRE

Status: PUBLISHED

Assigner: microsoft

Published:

Updated: 2026-01-16T21:50:24.474Z

Reserved: 2025-12-11T21:02:05.732Z

Link: CVE-2026-21223

cve-icon Vulnrichment

Updated: 2026-01-16T21:50:19.043Z

cve-icon NVD

Status : Received

Published: 2026-01-16T22:16:25.983

Modified: 2026-01-16T22:16:25.983

Link: CVE-2026-21223

cve-icon Redhat

No data.

cve-icon OpenCVE Enrichment

No data.

Weaknesses