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Fencer Intel
medium 5.1

CVE-2021-1281 json

Cisco IOS XE SD-WAN Software Privilege Escalation Vulnerability

published 5y ago modified 4mo ago also EUVD-2021-6748

cvss
5.1
version 3.1, CNA
cisa kev
Not listed
not in CISA's catalog
epss
0.3%
EPSS 0.3% chance of exploitation in 30 days, percentile 21%
public exploits
0
none known

Summary

A vulnerability in CLI management in Cisco IOS XE SD-WAN Software could allow an authenticated, local attacker to access the underlying operating system as the root user. This vulnerability is due to the way the software handles concurrent CLI sessions. An attacker could exploit this vulnerability by authenticating to the device as an administrative user and executing a sequence of commands. A successful exploit could allow the attacker to obtain access to the underlying operating system as the root user.

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CISA SSVC

Exploitation
none
Automatable
no
Technical impact
partial
Assessed
2y ago

Exploit prediction

0.29% chance of exploitation in the next 30 days, higher than 21% of all scored CVEs (FIRST EPSS, 2026-11-09).

CVSS scores

assigned by version score vector
CNA 3.1 5.1 CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:L/PR:H/UI:N/S:U/C:L/I:H/A:N
NVD 3.1 6.7 CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:L/PR:H/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:H
NVD 2.0 6.9 AV:L/AC:M/Au:N/C:C/I:C/A:C

Affected products

  • Cisco Cisco IOS XE Software

Classification

Weakness
  • CWE-399 Resource Management Errors
Technology feeds

References

Sources

Fencer Intel keeps one entry per vulnerability: the CVE id wins, then GHSA, and records that alias each other are merged, except that two CVEs always keep separate entries. The same data is available as JSON.