Patchfirst
CVE-2026-48172 KEVPublic exploit Critical · 9.8 EPSS 17.9%

LiteSpeed cPanel Plugin Privilege Escalation Vulnerability

LiteSpeed · cPanel Plugin

Summary

The LiteSpeed User-End cPanel Plugin, in versions before 2.4.5, contains a privilege assignment flaw in its handling of the Redis enable/disable feature that allows privilege escalation, possibly to root. An attacker with network access can exploit it without authentication or user interaction, using the plugin's configuration as the attack surface.

Official description · NVD

LiteSpeed User-End cPanel Plugin before 2.4.5 allows privilege escalation (possibly to root), as exploited in the wild in May 2026. Detection is best done via a command line of grep -rE "cpanel_jsonapi_func=redisAble" /var/cpanel/logs /usr/local/cpanel/logs/ 2>/dev/null in Bash. If you get no output, you have not been hit with exploitation of the vulnerability. If there is output, we recommend you examine the IP addresses in the list, determine if they are valid IP addresses, and if not, block them. To determine damage done, examine the system logs for use by the detected IP addresses. The issue is related to mishandling of Redis enable/disable features. The recommended minimum version is 2.4.7.

Breakdown
84.3 / 100
Exploited
Yes, in CISA KEV
Reports
0
Tactics
2/15

How an attack unfolds

Based on mappings. Select a step to see the evidence.
  1. How attackers get in

  2. What they do

First seen exploited the day it was disclosed. Public exploit code (PoC-in-GitHub) appeared 2 days after disclosure.

  1. DisclosedFirst seen exploitedVulnCheck KEV evidenceday 0
  2. Public exploit codePoC-in-GitHub+2 days
  3. Added to CISA KEVEU database agrees+5 days

CISA KEV listing is when exploitation was confirmed, not necessarily the first attack.

techniques

2 , grouped by in kill-chain order, 2 cited passages 2

Initial AccessTA0001

Exploit Public-Facing Application T1190 Medium
AI mapping from the description · how it is exploited

public-facing vulnerability exploited remotely without authentication

allows privilege escalation (possibly to root), as exploited in the wild
From the official description (NVD) Original (opens in a new tab) ↗

Privilege EscalationTA0004

Exploitation for Privilege Escalation T1068 Medium
AI mapping from the description · primary impact

direct impact is privilege escalation to root

allows privilege escalation (possibly to root)
From the official description (NVD) Original (opens in a new tab) ↗

Detection

0 rules for this CVE · 180 general rules for its techniques

Rules for this CVE

0 that reference CVE-2026-48172 directly.

CVE-specific rules are not available in this build. Search SigmaHQ ↗

Sigma rules © SigmaHQ, Detection Rule License 1.1; linked, not reproduced.

What security researchers reported

Not named in any threat report yet

Also mentioned in 50 community threat pulses (AlienVault OTX)

Weaker evidence

Pulses are indicator collections that anyone can publish. A mention is not confirmation of exploitation.

References

4 links, grouped by NVD tag
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