Rebecca Lewis takes a look at a recent security vulnerability:
Microsoft’s January 2026 Patch Tuesday included a security fix for SQL Server: CVE-2026-20803, an elevation of privilege vulnerability with CVSS score 7.2 (Important).
The vulnerability is classified as CWE-306: Missing Authentication for Critical Function. An attacker who already has high-level privileges on the SQL Server instance could exploit this flaw to escalate further — gaining debugging privileges, dumping system memory, and potentially extracting sensitive data or credentials.
Read on for more information about the CVE, what it requires to exploit, and how you can patch SQL Server to prevent it from being an issue. It’s interesting that this only affects SQL Server 2022 and 2025.