VulnerabilityPublished 11 Nov 2025Updated 14 Nov 2025

CVE-2025-13032: Avast (Free/Premiium/Ultimeat) Antivirus · Time-of-check Time-of-use (TOCTOU) Race Condition

Affects Avast (Free/Premiium/Ultimeat) AntivirusSource CVE Database V5

Not known to be exploited · CVSS 9.9 Critical.

Data as of 26 Oct 2026, 14:05 UTC

CVSS 3.1 base score

9.9Critical

How severe the flaw is on the 0–10 CVSS scale.

EPSS: 0.2% chance of exploitation in 30 days – higher than 16% of CVEsExploit Prediction Scoring System: the likelihood attackers will use this flaw soon.

CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:C/C:H/I:H/A:H

Attack Vector: Network
Attack Complexity: Low
Privileges Required: Low
User Interaction: None
Scope: Changed
Confidentiality: High
Integrity: High
Availability: High

Bold values are the worst case: easiest to exploit or largest impact.

Attack Vector: Network: The vulnerable component is bound to the network stack and the set of possible attackers extends beyond the other options listed, up to and including the entire Internet. Such a vulnerability is often termed 'remotely exploitable' and can be thought of as an attack being exploitable at the protocol level one or more network hops away (e.g., across one or more routers).
Attack Complexity: Low: Specialized access conditions or extenuating circumstances do not exist. An attacker can expect repeatable success against the vulnerable component.
Privileges Required: Low: The attacker is authorized with (i.e., requires) privileges that provide basic user capabilities that could normally affect only settings and files owned by a user. Alternatively, an attacker with Low privileges may have the ability to cause an impact only to non-sensitive resources.
User Interaction: None: The vulnerable system can be exploited without any interaction from any user.
Scope: Changed: An exploited vulnerability can affect resources beyond the security scope managed by the security authority of the vulnerable component. In this case, the vulnerable component and the impacted component are different and managed by different security authorities.
Confidentiality: High: There is total loss of confidentiality, resulting in all resources within the impacted component being divulged to the attacker. Alternatively, access to only some restricted information is obtained, but the disclosed information presents a direct, serious impact.
Integrity: High: There is a total loss of integrity, or a complete loss of protection. For example, the attacker is able to modify any/all files protected by the impacted component. Alternatively, only some files can be modified, but malicious modification would present a direct, serious consequence to the impacted component.
Availability: High: There is total loss of availability, resulting in the attacker being able to fully deny access to resources in the impacted component; this loss is either sustained (while the attacker continues to deliver the attack) or persistent (the condition persists even after the attack has completed). Alternatively, the attacker has the ability to deny some availability, but the loss of availability presents a direct, serious consequence to the impacted component (e.g., the attacker cannot disrupt existing connections, but can prevent new connections; the attacker can repeatedly exploit a vulnerability that, in each instance of a successful attack, leaks a only small amount of memory, but after repeated exploitation causes a service to become completely unavailable).

Definitions: FIRST CVSS v3.1 specification.

Exploitation evidence

Disclosed: evidence found.
CVE published 11 Nov 2025
Detectable: no evidence on record.
No public nuclei template indexed
Weaponised: no evidence on record.
No public exploit code indexed in Metasploit or Exploit-DB
Exploited in the wildExploited: no evidence on record.
Not in CISA KEV and no source reports exploitation
Observed by OffSeq MirageSeen by Mirage: no evidence on record.
No attack traffic recorded by OffSeq Mirage sensors

A missing step is not evidence of safety. Sources: cve.org (opens in a new tab), the Metasploit, Exploit-DB and nuclei-templates index as of 26 Oct 2026.

Disclosed: The CVE record is public on cve.org. Its publication is t = 0.
Detectable: A public nuclei template can find exposed instances, for defenders and attackers alike.
Weaponised: Public exploit code exists in Metasploit or Exploit-DB, or CISA SSVC or the CVSS exploit maturity reports a public proof of concept.
Exploited in the wild: CISA KEV lists it, CISA SSVC rates exploitation active, or a source reports attacks.
Observed by OffSeq Mirage: OffSeq Mirage honeypot sensors recorded attack traffic for this CVE, or found exposed hosts without attack traffic.

Moments are spaced evenly, not to scale; a dashed line marks a gap of six months or more. Deltas count from t = 0. Sources that give only a date (CISA KEV, Exploit-DB, or a time of exactly 00:00Z) read “same day” rather than hours. Metasploit modules carry the flaw’s disclosure date, not their release date, and nuclei templates carry no date, so both appear above but not on the timeline.

What to do

Affected software

Product	Affected	Fixed in
Avast (Free/Premiium/Ultimeat) Antivirus	Affected =0	Fixed in–

AI-suggested

Immediate implementation of strict local user access controls to minimize the number of users with local login privileges, reducing the attack surface.
Monitor and audit kernel driver activity and system logs for unusual or suspicious behavior indicative of exploitation attempts.
Employ application whitelisting and endpoint detection and response (EDR) solutions to detect and block unauthorized privilege escalation attempts.
Once available, promptly apply official patches or updates from Avast to remediate the vulnerability.
In the interim, consider disabling or restricting the Avast sandbox kernel driver if feasible without compromising endpoint protection, after thorough testing.
Educate IT and security teams about the vulnerability specifics to enhance detection and response capabilities.
Conduct vulnerability scanning and penetration testing focused on privilege escalation vectors to identify potential exploitation paths.
Maintain robust backup and recovery procedures to mitigate impact in case of successful exploitation.
Coordinate with Avast support and threat intelligence providers for updates and indicators of compromise related to this vulnerability.

Description

Double fetch in sandbox kernel driver in Avast/AVG Antivirus <25.3 on windows allows local attacker to escalate privelages via pool overflow.

Impact

For European organizations, the impact of CVE-2025-13032 is significant due to the widespread use of Avast Antivirus on Windows endpoints across enterprises, government agencies, and critical infrastructure sectors. Successful exploitation would grant attackers SYSTEM-level privileges, enabling full control over affected machines. This could lead to unauthorized access to sensitive data, disruption of business operations, deployment of ransomware or other malware, and lateral movement within corporate networks. The critical nature of the vulnerability threatens confidentiality, integrity, and availability of systems. Organizations in sectors such as finance, healthcare, energy, and public administration are particularly at risk due to the sensitive nature of their data and the potential for operational disruption. Additionally, the vulnerability could undermine trust in endpoint security solutions, complicating incident response and recovery efforts. The absence of known exploits currently provides a window for proactive mitigation, but the high severity score indicates that exploitation could have devastating consequences.

CWE-367Time-of-check Time-of-use (TOCTOU) Race Condition (opens in a new tab)
Base weaknessLikelihood of exploit: Medium
The product checks the state of a resource before using that resource, but the resource's state can change between the check and the use in a way that invalidates the results of the check.
Implementation
The most basic advice for TOCTOU vulnerabilities is to not perform a check before the use. This does not resolve the underlying issue of the execution of a function on a resource whose state and identity cannot be assured, but it does help to limit the false sense of security given by the check.
Implementation
When the file being altered is owned by the current user and group, set the effective gid and uid to that of the current user and group when executing this statement.
Architecture and Design
Limit the interleaving of operations on files from multiple processes.
OWASP Cheat Sheets
Abuse Case (opens in a new tab)
OWASP ASVS 4.0.3
V1.11.3 (opens in a new tab)
V11.1.6 (opens in a new tab)
V1.11.2 (opens in a new tab)
Attack patterns
Leveraging Race Conditions via Symbolic Links (opens in a new tab)
Leveraging Time-of-Check and Time-of-Use (TOCTOU) Race Conditions (opens in a new tab)
From MITRE CWE, MITRE CAPEC and OWASP (Top 10, OpenCRE).

References

gendigital.com/us/en/contact-us/security-advisories/ (opens in a new tab)

Community reviews

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Exploitation evidence

What to do

Affected software

Description

AI analysisMachine-generated, updated 18 Nov 2025, 16:46 UTC

WeaknessesCWE-367

Technical details

References

Community reviews

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