CVE-2020-10849Public exploit

Screen-lock password recovery via unthrottled guessing

Published Mar 24, 2020 · Updated Aug 4, 2024

Improper brute-force protection in Samsung mobile devices on Android 8.x through 10.0 allows attackers to recover screen-lock passwords. The Gatekeeper trustlet fails to validate password-attempt input adequately, permitting every possible pattern code to be tried within hours. Exploitation requires prior code execution and privilege escalation into the secure-world trustlet; without that chain, locked data remains protected.

CVSS severity9.8
Critical
EPSS probability0.40%
Next 30 days · Sep 16, 2026
Known exploitationUnconfirmed
Based on sourced intelligence
Hinoki checkNot available
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Summary

What happened

Improper brute-force protection in Samsung mobile devices on Android 8.x through 10.0 allows attackers to recover screen-lock passwords. The Gatekeeper trustlet fails to validate password-attempt input adequately, permitting every possible pattern code to be tried within hours. Exploitation requires prior code execution and privilege escalation into the secure-world trustlet; without that chain, locked data remains protected.

The record

CVE
CVE-2020-10849
Published
Mar 24, 2020
Updated
Aug 4, 2024
Vendor
Unknown vendor
Product
Unknown product
Classifications
CWE-307, T1110.001
Attack vector
local
Privileges
admin

Timeline

How it unfolded

  1. Mar 24, 2020CVE publishedPublication date reported by the CVE source.
  2. Aug 4, 2024Record updatedLatest update available in the CVE record.

Exploitability

Present is not the same as exploitable

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Is a vulnerable build present?

Affected buildAffected product and version details are unavailable.

What conditions does exploitation require?

Attack vectorlocal
Required privilegesadmin

What is affected?

Affected products and versions are unavailable in this record.

Published CVSS scores

5.0NIST NVDAV:N/AC:L/Au:N/C:P/I:N/A:N
9.8NIST NVDCVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:H

CVSS describes severity. EPSS estimates exploitation probability.

Attacks

What attackers are doing with it

Daily unique IPs observed by Shadowserver honeypots for known exploited vulnerabilities (KEVs). Missing observations do not establish an absence of attacks.

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No observations available

Sep 10, 2026Sep 16, 2026
Latest reporting daySep 16, 2026
Latest daily unique IPsUnavailable
Prior 30-day averageUnavailable
SourceShadowserver honeypots (KEV)
Vectorlocal
Privilegesadmin
Known exploitationUnconfirmed
Public exploitPublished

Weakness, pattern, technique

CWE-307Improper Restriction of Excessive Authentication Attempts
T1110.001Password Guessing

Public exploit references

Labels summarize the accepted research assessment. They do not indicate a test against your environment.

Technologies

Your stack

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Your stack

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