Privilege Escalation
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def
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gaining higher-level access to a system than originally granted, by exploiting a bug or design flaw — a high-priority class of vulnerability, since it commonly leads to the highest level of access available
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horizontal privilege escalation
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a specific variant where User A gains access to User B's resources, rather than gaining admin-level access
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mitigation
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patch quickly, keep anti-virus/anti-malware updated, use Data Execution Prevention and address space layout randomization
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example
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CVE-2023-29336 — a Win32k Elevation of Privilege vulnerability (May 2023) affecting several Windows Server and Windows 10 versions, allowing an attacker to gain SYSTEM privileges
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related