Critical Vulnerability Exposes Industrial Robot Fleets to Hacking

Universal Robots, a Danish company specializing in collaborative industrial robots, or cobots, has patched a critical vulnerability affecting one of its operating systems. Advisories published last week by the cybersecurity agency CISA and Universal Robots revealed that PolyScope 5, an operating system and GUI designed to power and control the company’s cobots, is affected by CVE-2026-8153, an OS command injection vulnerability in the Dashboard Server interface. The flaw, rated critical with a CVSS score of 9.8, has been patched in PolyScope 5.25.1. “The Dashboard Server accepts user-controlled input and passes it to the underlying operating system without proper neutralization of special elements,” Universal Robots explained. “An unauthenticated attacker with network access to the Dashboard Server port can craft commands that are executed on the robot’s operating system, leading to remote code execution and compromise of the controller with high impact to confidentiality, integrity, and availability.” The vendor noted in its advisory that “Remote exploitation of CVE-2026-8153 requires the robot’s Dashboard Server to be enabled in the UI, and its port to be reachable by the attacker. UR robots are not designed to be accessible directly from the Internet, and direct inbound Internet access is typically prevented by the company firewall.” However, Vera Mens, the Claroty security researcher credited with finding and reporting CVE-2026-8153, noted that while many industrial robots lack a remote management interface, cobots made by Universal Robots have a control box with an Ethernet port that can be used on demand.  “Customers may use this option to deliver information to a central management unit, to use legacy field protocols such as MODBUS and EtherNet/IP to manipulate other OT equipment, or to control the cobot remotely,” Mens told SecurityWeek. “Although these networks are generally not publicly exposed, they are often flat and lack proper segmentation; therefore, gaining an initial foothold may not be difficult.” In a flat, unsegmented network, an attacker could exploit the vulnerability to compromise one or more cobots.  “The control box powering the cobot’s application layer is a general-purpose Linux computer connected via Ethernet and serial ports to a variety of other equipment. The least severe outcome is complete control of a single cobot (which may pose hazards to humans), but the impact can escalate to compromise of an entire fleet of cobots and their peripherals,” Mens warned. Related: Polish Security Agency Reports ICS Breaches at Five Water Treatment Plants Related: Claude AI Guided Hackers Toward OT Assets During Water Utility Intrusion Related: ICS Patch Tuesday: New Security Advisories From Siemens, Schneider, CISA WRITTEN BY Eduard Kovacs Eduard Kovacs (@EduardKovacs) is senior managing editor at SecurityWeek. He worked as a high school IT teacher before starting a career in journalism in 2011. Eduard holds a bachelor’s degree in industrial informatics and a master’s degree in computer techniques applied in electrical engineering. 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