CVE-1999-0576
Official description Straight from the sourceThe vendor's or NVD's own wording, published unedited. Authoritative, but often terse — it says what broke, rarely what to do.
NVD · uneditedA Windows NT system's file audit policy does not log an event success or failure for security-critical files or directories.
Technical summary Written by usOur analysis, written from the advisory, the CVSS vector and the affected-version data. It adds context the advisory leaves out, and never invents facts that are not in the source.
dbcve analysis · moderate confidenceWindows NT's file audit policy is not configured to log success or failure events for security-critical files or directories. This allows unauthorized access or modifications to sensitive files to occur without generating any audit trail, making intrusion detection and forensic investigation impossible.
Verify against the referenced sources before acting — the references below are authoritative for this CVE, this summary is not.
Affected products & versions What the vendor confirmedThe version ranges the vendor confirmed as vulnerable. If your version sits inside a range here, treat yourself as exposed until you have upgraded.
NVD · CPE dataall versionsCVSS breakdown How the score is builtThe industry scoring standard. It rates how the flaw is reached, what it takes to exploit, and what an attacker gains — the score is derived from those, not the other way round.
From the vector- Attack vector
- Network
- Complexity
- Low
- Authentication
- None
- Confidentiality
- Partial
- Integrity
- Partial
- Availability
- Partial
AV:N/AC:L/Au:N/C:P/I:P/A:P
Am I affected? How to checkSteps we derive from the advisory and the affected-version data, so you can decide whether this CVE reaches your setup. They are a guide, not a scan — your own configuration is the authority.
dbcve checksWork through these to decide whether this CVE applies to you.
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Verify audit policy is enabled in Windows NTOpen User Manager for Domains (usrmgr.exe), go to Policies menu, select Audit. Check if auditing is enabled (the window should not be greyed out or show 'No Audit').Affected if Auditing is disabled or set to 'No Audit' in the audit policy settings
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Check if file/object access auditing is configuredIn the same Audit policy dialog, verify that 'File And Object Access' is checked/selected in the audit category list.Affected if File And Object Access is not selected in the audit policy categories
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Confirm success and failure logging for object accessIn the Audit policy under File And Object Access, verify that both 'Success' and 'Failure' checkboxes are enabled/checked.Affected if Either Success or Failure logging is not enabled for File And Object Access auditing
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Identify security-critical directories that require audit coverageReview the system for directories containing sensitive data (e.g., system directories, application data folders, configuration directories) and note their paths.Affected if Security-critical directories exist and no file auditing is configured for them (this is determined by checking if auditing was enabled in steps 1-3)
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Verify Event Log security log is present and accessibleOpen Event Viewer (eventvwr.exe), expand the Security log. Check that events are being recorded and the log has entries.Affected if Security log is empty, disabled, or cannot be accessed (indicating auditing is not functioning)
A system is affected if file/object access auditing is disabled in NT User Manager Audit policy, or if success/failure logging is not enabled for security-critical files and directories.
Generated from the published advisory. Verify against your own configuration.
Remediation Closing itWhat it takes to close this. Where a vendor fix exists we point at it; where none exists we say so plainly, and can build one. Effort estimates are scoped from the advisory, not from your codebase.
From vendor dataConfigure Windows NT file auditing policy to log both success and failure events for all security-critical files and directories to enable detection of unauthorized access attempts.
- Consultation3.0 h
- Implementation2.0 h
- Testing2.0 h
- Review / QA1.0 h
An estimate, not a bill — we confirm scope with you before any work starts. Need it this week? Rush from $2,304.
Scan for this in your stack
Free · runs locallyCheck whether your project pulls in CVE-1999-0576 — or any other known-vulnerable package — straight from your lock files. Free and open source; it runs locally and uploads nothing.
References Go to the primary sourcePrimary sources — vendor advisories, patches and trackers. Where our summary and a reference disagree, the reference wins.
Primary sourcesPractitioner notes
ContributedPeer-ranked notes from engineers who’ve handled CVE-1999-0576 in production — separate from our analysis above.
The advisory tells you what broke. It rarely tells you what actually worked. If you’ve dealt with this one, that detail is what the next engineer is searching for.
- The version that genuinely resolved it — not the one the vendor claimed
- A config change or rule that shut the vector down
- A gotcha in the upgrade path that cost you an afternoon
No notes yet
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- Verified mitigations, workarounds, and config changes
- Version or environment caveats, and links to real fixes
- No weaponised exploit code, or anything meant to cause harm
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