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Introduction
The world’s most elite cybersecurity researchers gathered once again at the famous Pwn2Own hacking competition, and this year’s Berlin edition turned into one of the most intense events in the contest’s history. Hosted during the OffensiveCon conference from May 14 to May 16, Pwn2Own Berlin 2026 showcased just how vulnerable modern enterprise systems, AI platforms, virtualization products, and operating systems still are, even when fully patched.
By the end of the three-day event, ethical hackers had successfully exploited 47 previously unknown zero-day vulnerabilities and earned a combined $1,298,250 in rewards. The competition highlighted a growing reality in cybersecurity: attackers are evolving rapidly, and technologies like AI agents, cloud-native systems, and enterprise collaboration platforms are becoming prime targets.
Massive Rewards Paid for Zero-Day Discoveries
This year’s contest revolved around enterprise software, artificial intelligence technologies, web browsers, virtualization products, cloud environments, and operating systems. Researchers attempted to break into fully updated systems using never-before-seen exploits, proving that even the latest security patches cannot guarantee total protection.
The first day alone resulted in 24 unique zero-day discoveries, with contestants earning an impressive $523,000 in rewards. Momentum continued into the second day, where another 15 zero-days were demonstrated for $385,750 in payouts. On the final day, hackers uncovered eight more vulnerabilities and collected an additional $389,500.
The biggest winner of the event was the cybersecurity research team DEVCORE, which dominated the competition with 50.5 Master of Pwn points and a staggering $505,000 in total earnings. The team successfully compromised major Microsoft products including SharePoint, Exchange, Edge, and Windows 11.
Coming in second was STARLabs SG, earning $242,500 alongside 25 Master of Pwn points. Out Of Bounds secured third place with $95,750 and 12.75 points.
Orange Tsai Delivers the Most Valuable Exploit Chain
One of the standout moments of the event came from Cheng-Da Tsai, better known in the security community as Orange Tsai. Representing the DEVCORE Research Team, he demonstrated an advanced exploit chain against Microsoft Exchange.
By chaining together three separate vulnerabilities, Orange Tsai achieved remote code execution with SYSTEM-level privileges, earning the contest’s highest single reward of $200,000. The exploit demonstrated how dangerous chained vulnerabilities can become when combined strategically.
Orange Tsai also earned another $175,000 after successfully escaping the Microsoft Edge sandbox using four logic bugs. These demonstrations reinforced his reputation as one of the world’s top offensive security researchers.
Windows 11 and Linux Systems Remain Key Targets
Microsoft Windows 11 was repeatedly compromised during the competition. Researchers successfully exploited the operating system multiple times using local privilege escalation vulnerabilities, proving that attackers can still gain elevated system access despite Microsoft’s ongoing hardening efforts.
Linux environments were not spared either. Valentina Palmiotti, also known as “chompie,” from IBM X-Force Offensive Research, earned $70,000 after successfully rooting Red Hat Linux for Workstations and exploiting an NVIDIA Container Toolkit zero-day vulnerability.
Throughout the event, researchers also targeted Red Hat Enterprise Linux for Workstations several more times, uncovering additional privilege escalation flaws.
AI Coding Agents Enter the Cybersecurity Battlefield
One of the most important developments at Pwn2Own Berlin 2026 was the inclusion of AI-focused targets. Researchers successfully demonstrated zero-day vulnerabilities affecting AI coding agents, marking a significant shift in how cybersecurity competitions are evolving.
As artificial intelligence tools become increasingly integrated into software development pipelines, attackers are beginning to explore methods for manipulating, escaping, or abusing these systems. The fact that AI coding agents were compromised at such a prestigious event sends a warning to organizations rushing to adopt AI-assisted development without sufficient security validation.
The inclusion of local inference systems and LLM-related targets also reflects growing concerns around the security of large language model infrastructure and AI deployment environments.
VMware ESXi Exploited Through Memory Corruption
On the third and final day of the contest, researchers successfully exploited VMware ESXi using a memory corruption vulnerability. Since ESXi is widely used in enterprise virtualization environments, this type of attack carries enormous implications for corporate infrastructure security.
Compromising virtualization layers can potentially allow attackers to impact multiple virtual machines simultaneously, making hypervisor-level vulnerabilities especially dangerous in enterprise environments and cloud data centers.
Vendors Given 90 Days Before Public Disclosure
As with previous Pwn2Own events, affected vendors now have a 90-day window to develop and release security patches before Trend Micro’s Zero Day Initiative publicly discloses technical details of the vulnerabilities.
This responsible disclosure model has become one of the defining aspects of Pwn2Own. Instead of exposing vulnerabilities immediately, researchers work with vendors to improve security while still receiving recognition and financial rewards for their discoveries.
Last year’s Berlin edition awarded $1,078,750 for 29 zero-day vulnerabilities. This year’s event surpassed those numbers significantly, both in total payout and total vulnerabilities discovered, showing that the attack surface of modern enterprise technologies continues to grow rapidly.
What Undercode Say:
Pwn2Own Berlin 2026 reveals a critical truth about the current state of cybersecurity: modern systems are becoming more complex faster than organizations can properly secure them. The event was not simply a competition between hackers and vendors. It was a live demonstration of how fragile enterprise ecosystems can become when AI systems, virtualization layers, browsers, cloud services, and operating systems all intersect.
The rise in successful zero-day exploits compared to previous years should concern enterprise defenders. Forty-seven zero-days in just three days indicates that attackers still have abundant opportunities to bypass security controls, even in fully patched environments. This is especially alarming because the products targeted are among the most widely deployed technologies in governments, corporations, and cloud infrastructures worldwide.
Microsoft products once again became central targets during the event. Exchange, SharePoint, Edge, and Windows 11 all suffered successful compromises. This pattern reinforces a long-standing reality in cybersecurity: products with massive enterprise adoption naturally become high-priority targets for elite researchers and real-world threat actors alike.
The Microsoft Exchange exploit chain demonstrated by Orange Tsai is particularly important because Exchange servers remain attractive targets for espionage groups and ransomware operators. Achieving SYSTEM-level remote code execution through chained bugs shows how devastating multi-stage attacks can become when defenders fail to detect initial compromise activity early enough.
The repeated success against Windows 11 also highlights a broader issue. Operating system security improvements are helping, but attackers continue adapting. Privilege escalation vulnerabilities remain extremely valuable because they allow attackers to move from limited access to full administrative control. In real-world intrusions, this often becomes the difference between a blocked attack and a catastrophic breach.
Another major concern is the growing focus on AI systems. AI coding agents are increasingly being trusted with software generation, code review, infrastructure management, and automation tasks. However, many organizations are deploying these tools faster than they can properly secure them. The fact that researchers already discovered exploitable zero-days in AI coding agents should serve as an early warning sign for the industry.
Virtualization attacks against VMware ESXi are equally dangerous. Hypervisor vulnerabilities are among the most valuable targets in enterprise environments because they potentially allow attackers to compromise entire infrastructures rather than individual machines. In cloud-heavy architectures, such attacks could become devastating.
Pwn2Own also demonstrates why offensive security research remains essential. Ethical hackers participating in these contests are effectively stress-testing the digital infrastructure used globally. Without these controlled environments, many vulnerabilities would likely be discovered first by cybercriminals or state-sponsored threat groups.
The event additionally exposes the limitations of traditional defensive strategies. Fully patched systems were still compromised repeatedly. This means organizations can no longer rely solely on patch management as their primary defense strategy. Modern cybersecurity now requires layered monitoring, behavioral analytics, endpoint detection, network segmentation, zero-trust architecture, and rapid incident response capabilities.
The increasing prize money is another important indicator. Vendors and security programs are paying more because advanced exploitation skills are becoming rarer and more valuable. At the same time, black-market values for zero-days continue to rise, especially for enterprise-grade products and virtualization systems.
The inclusion of cloud-native and containerized environments at Pwn2Own Berlin reflects another important shift. Organizations increasingly rely on Kubernetes, containers, AI workloads, and hybrid cloud infrastructures. Attackers are naturally following that transition. Future hacking contests will likely include even more cloud orchestration targets and AI infrastructure attacks.
Cybersecurity leaders should pay close attention to the lessons from this event. Pwn2Own is not just entertainment for security researchers. It is one of the clearest previews of tomorrow’s real-world attack techniques.
Fact Checker Results
✅ Pwn2Own Berlin 2026 concluded with 47 zero-day vulnerabilities successfully exploited during the contest.
✅ DEVCORE earned the highest rewards and won the “Master of Pwn” title after compromising multiple Microsoft technologies.
✅ AI coding agents and virtualization platforms like VMware ESXi were among the major new attack surfaces highlighted during the event.
Prediction
🔮 AI-focused exploitation categories will become a permanent and increasingly dominant part of future Pwn2Own competitions.
🔮 Enterprise virtualization platforms and cloud-native infrastructure will likely see higher-value bug bounties due to their growing strategic importance.
🔮 Microsoft Exchange, AI agents, and container ecosystems may become top priorities for both ethical hackers and advanced cybercrime groups over the next two years.
🕵️📝Let’s dive deep and fact‑check.
References:
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