CVE-2026-86819

Waves Central local privilege escalation via Improper XPC Client Authentication in macOS

HIGH
7.1
CVSS Score
Published: September 8, 2026 at 08:22 PM UTC
Updated: September 14, 2026 at 02:17 PM UTC
1 product affected across 1 vendorWaves Central

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Severity
HIGH7.1
Exploit prediction
EPSS 0.1%
SSVC
No known exploit

Description

Waves Central for macOS contains a local privilege escalation in the privileged helper service. The helper authorizes connecting XPC clients by comparing the caller's code-signing certificate chain for equality with its own, rather than validating the caller against a pinned code requirement (application identifier and Team ID). A local, authenticated user can execute code within the vendor-signed process, satisfy the helper's client check, and cause the helper to execute a script with root privileges. Fixed in 17.0.

Affected

Our own answer: ranges merged, affected separated from platform-only, with confidence and review flags.

16.6.2 ≤ v < 17.016.6.2
Vendor states this is fixed in 17.0 (unaffected)

Remediation

No guide yet

No remediation guidance has been written for this CVE yet, and no fixed version or vendor advisory is recorded against it.

SSVC — Action Prioritization

SSVCNo known exploitNot automatableTotal impact

SSVC signals action urgency (what to patch first), separate from CVSS which measures severity.

CVSS

7.1HIGHcisa-cg
Attack Vector
LOCAL
Complexity
LOW
Privileges
LOW
User Interaction
NONE
Scope
UNCHANGED
Confidentiality
HIGH
Integrity
HIGH
Availability
NONE
Vector?

Quick Info

StatusAWAITING ANALYSIS
CWE
CWE-862

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