Quick answers
- Is CVE-2026-18822 exploited in the wild?
- No. Junglewise Threat Intelligence has no report of CVE-2026-18822 being exploited in the wild.
- How severe is CVE-2026-18822?
- Medium severity, with a CVSS score of 4.4, published 20 August 2026.
- Which products and versions are affected?
- IBM Aix 7.2, 7.3; IBM PowerVM VIOS 4.1.
- Is there a fix for CVE-2026-18822?
- No fixed version is recorded yet. Check the vendor's advisory in the references below. If you run it, Junglewise drafts a mitigation that fits your setup and applies it once you approve, with senior security engineers behind it.
- How is CVE-2026-18822 attacked?
- It is attacked with local access.
- Am I affected by CVE-2026-18822?
- Check whether you run IBM Aix or IBM PowerVM VIOS at an affected version. Junglewise does that check for you around the clock: connect your code, cloud and domains, and it matches new vulnerabilities like this one against what you actually run and tells you when one reaches you.
Technical details
The vulnerability is a resource consumption issue (CWE-400-class) in directory parsing logic within IBM AIX 7.2, 7.3 and PowerVM VIOS 4.1. A local attacker with system access can trigger uncontrolled resource consumption by crafting malicious directory records, leading to denial of service. The attack requires local access (not network-based) and no special privileges beyond basic user-level access. Successful exploitation results in system unavailability. IBM has released security updates via Service Packs and Fix Packs to remediate this issue.
Affected products
- IBM AIX 7.2, 7.3
- IBM PowerVM VIOS 4.1
Timeline
- 2026-08-20: disclosed