OpenClaw versions prior to 2026.3.25 suffer a privilege‑escalation flaw that occurs when the system silently accepts shared‑authentication reconnections. An attacker can trigger a local reconnection to auto‑approve scope‑upgrade requests, which elevates a paired device’s permissions from operator.read to operator.admin and enables remote code execution on the node. The weakness is classified as CWE‑648.

Vendors and products affected are OpenClaw’s OpenClaw application. The vulnerability exists in all releases before the 2026.3.25 patch. Users running any prior version on their node devices are at risk.

With a CVSS score of 8.5 the issue is considered High severity. No EPSS score is available and it is not listed in CISA’s KEV catalog. The attack requires local access to a device to trigger the reconnection, so the threat is primarily local; however, the resulting privilege escalation can lead to full remote code execution. Because the vulnerability auto‑approves scope upgrades, exploitation can be carried out without user interaction once local access is achieved.