Summary
Impact: Elevation of Privilege. Microsoft rating: Important. Not known to be exploited — Exploitation Less Likely. Customer action: Required.
Details
How could an attacker exploit this vulnerability?
To exploit this vulnerability, an attacker would first have to log on to the system. An attacker could then run a specially crafted application that could exploit the vulnerability and take control of an affected system.
Is the Preview Pane an attack vector for this vulnerability?
No, the Preview Pane is not an attack vector.
What privileges could be gained by an attacker who successfully exploited this vulnerability?
An attacker who successfully exploited this vulnerability could gain ROOT privileges.
Security updates
4.78 — https://support.office.com/en-us/article/Check-for-Office-for-Mac-updates-automatically-bfd1e497-c24d-4754-92ab-910a4074d7c1
Vulnerabilities 1
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High 7.8
Microsoft AutoUpdate (MAU) Elevation of Privilege Vulnerability
Incorrect default permissions in Microsoft AutoUpdate (MAU) allows an authorized attacker to elevate privileges locally.
Revision history
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#1
Information published.
References
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CVE-2025-29801 Microsoft AutoUpdate (MAU) Elevation of Privilege Vulnerability - HTML
https://msrc.microsoft.com/update-guide/vulnerability/CVE-2025-29801
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Microsoft Exploitability Index
https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/msrc/exploitability-index?rtc=1
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Microsoft Support Lifecycle
https://support.microsoft.com/lifecycle
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Common Vulnerability Scoring System
https://www.first.org/cvss