Gateway Plug InApplication · Citrix
CVE-2020-8257
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 · uneditedImproper privilege management on services run by Citrix Gateway Plug-in for Windows, versions before and including 13.0-61.48 and 12.1-58.15, lead to privilege escalation attacks
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 · high confidenceImproper privilege management in Citrix Gateway Plug-in for Windows services allows unprivileged or low-privileged users to escalate to higher system privileges. The vulnerability affects versions 13.0-61.48 and earlier, and 12.1-58.15 and earlier, potentially allowing local attackers to gain administrative access through improperly secured service configurations.
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 data
Gateway Plug InApplication
>= 12.0, <= 12.1-58.15>= 13.0, <= 13.0-61.48CVSS 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
- Privileges
- None
- User interaction
- None
- Scope
- Unchanged
- Confidentiality
- High
- Integrity
- High
- Availability
- High
CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:H
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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Identify if Citrix Gateway Plug-in is installedOpen Control Panel > Programs and Features, or run 'Get-WmiObject -Class Win32_Product' in PowerShell, and look for entries containing 'Citrix Gateway' or 'Citrix Gateway Plug-in'Affected if The software is listed in installed programs
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Determine the installed versionIf installed, note the version number from the Programs and Features list, or check the file version of the main executable (typically in C:\Program Files\Citrix\Gateway\ or C:\Program Files (x86)\Citrix\Gateway\) by right-clicking the .exe and selecting Properties > DetailsAffected if The version falls within 12.0 to 12.1-58.15 inclusive, or 13.0 to 13.0-61.48 inclusive
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Review Citrix Gateway Windows service configurationOpen Services console (services.msc) and locate any services related to Citrix Gateway or NetScaler Gateway. Right-click each service, select Properties, and examine the 'Log on as' account and the path to the executableAffected if The service runs under a privileged account (such as LocalSystem or a domain admin) and the executable path points to the vulnerable Citrix Gateway installation folder
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Check file permissions on Citrix Gateway service executablesRight-click the Citrix Gateway service executable in File Explorer, go to Properties > Security, and verify which users or groups have Write or Write+Execute permissions on the executable or its parent folderAffected if Unprivileged users have Write or Modify permissions to the service executable or its containing directory, allowing them to replace it with malicious code
A user is affected if the Citrix Gateway Plug-in is installed with a version between 12.0 and 12.1-58.15 or between 13.0 and 13.0-61.48 and the service executable has weak permissions allowing modification by non-admin users.
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 dataUpgrade Citrix Gateway Plug-in for Windows to versions beyond 13.0-61.48 and 12.1-58.15, or apply the corresponding security patches from Citrix's official knowledge base.
Fix this in Gateway Plug In
Scoped from the published advisory
- Consultation2.0 h
- Implementation3.0 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 $2,272.
Scan for this in your stack
Free · runs locallyCheck whether your project pulls in CVE-2020-8257 — 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-2020-8257 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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A place for practitioners to share what actually worked: a mitigation you’ve tested, a configuration change, a version- or environment-specific caveat, or a link to a verified patch. The most useful notes rise to the top as peers upvote them, so the signal stays high.
- 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
- No spam, self-promotion, credentials, or personal data