Okuzeka
Software Engineering vocabulary · APIs, Networking and Security

Privilege escalation

Meaning in software engineering, with examples

nounCommon term

In software engineering, privilege escalation means: Gaining higher access rights than one was given, for example moving from a normal user account to administrator, usually by abusing a flaw or misconfiguration.

In Turkish: yetki yükseltme, hak yükseltme

How it is used

Common in pentest reports and incident timelines. 'Vertical' escalation means gaining higher rights; 'horizontal' escalation means reaching another user's rights at the same level. Often shortened to 'privesc'. Least privilege and regular patching limit the risk.

Example sentences

  1. The vulnerability allows local privilege escalation on unpatched Windows hosts.

  2. The timeline shows privilege escalation about an hour after the first login.

Common collocations

  • local privilege escalation
  • vertical privilege escalation
  • horizontal privilege escalation
  • escalate privileges
  • least privilegeThe security principle that every user, service or program should get only the permissions it really needs for its job, and nothing more.
  • lateral movementThe way attackers move from the first compromised machine to other systems inside the same network, looking for valuable data or higher privileges.
  • exploitA piece of code or a technique that takes advantage of a vulnerability to make a system do something it was not designed to do.
  • escalateTo pass an alert, incident or problem to a more senior person or team because it is serious or beyond your own authority or skills.

This word in other fields

The same English word can have a different meaning in another field:

More terms: APIs, Networking and Security

Practise with graded reading

Reading at the right level is the fastest way to make new words stick. Pick free English books by level: