Summary
CVE-2026-81476 is an OS Command Injection vulnerability (CWE-78) in Dell OpenManage Server Administrator (OMSA) affecting all versions prior to 11.1.0.3. The flaw allows an unauthenticated attacker with network access to inject and execute arbitrary OS commands on the affected system, resulting in full compromise of confidentiality, integrity, and availability. Dell rates the issue High severity with a CVSS v3.1 base score of 8.1.
Technical details
- Root cause: OMSA fails to properly neutralize special elements in input that is later used to construct an OS command, enabling command injection (CWE-78: Improper Neutralization of Special Elements used in an OS Command).
- Trigger conditions: No authentication or user interaction is required; the attacker only needs network reachability to the vulnerable OMSA service/interface.
- Attack vector: Network (AV:N), with High attack complexity (AC:H), no privileges required (PR:N), and no user interaction (UI:N), meaning exploitation likely depends on specific conditions or timing rather than being trivially point-and-click.
- Impact: Successful exploitation leads to remote code execution with High impact to confidentiality, integrity, and availability (C:H/I:H/A:H), potentially giving an attacker full control of the underlying host running OMSA.
- Disclosure context: This vulnerability was disclosed alongside 20 other CVEs in the same Dell advisory (DSA-2026-403) covering various OMSA network-access issues, several of which also affect versions prior to 11.1.0.3.
Affected software
- Dell OpenManage Server Administrator Managed Node (Windows Patch) — versions prior to 11.1.0.3
- Dell OpenManage Server Administrator Managed Node for RHEL 8.10 — versions prior to 11.1.0.3
- Dell OpenManage Server Administrator Managed Node for RHEL 9.4 — versions prior to 11.1.0.3
- Dell OpenManage Server Administrator Managed Node for SLES 15 — versions prior to 11.1.0.3
- Dell OpenManage Server Administrator Managed Node for Ubuntu 22.04 — versions prior to 11.1.0.3
Severity
- CVSS v3.1 Base Score: 8.1 (High)
- Vector:
CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:H/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:H
Mitigation and recommended actions
- Immediate: Upgrade Dell OpenManage Server Administrator to version 11.1.0.3 or later, using the platform-specific patch (Windows, RHEL 8.10, RHEL 9.4, SLES 15, or Ubuntu 22.04) available through Dell’s support portal.
- If patching cannot be applied immediately: Restrict network access to the OMSA management interface/service to trusted management networks only (e.g., via firewall rules or network segmentation), and avoid exposing OMSA directly to untrusted or internet-facing networks until the patch is applied.
- Review Dell’s advisory DSA-2026-403 for the full list of related vulnerabilities patched in the same release, as multiple other high-severity issues are remediated in version 11.1.0.3.