CVE intelligence and bounded remediation
CVE-2023-20109 — Cisco IOS and IOS XE Group Encrypted Transport VPN Out-of-Bounds Write Vulnerability
A vulnerability in the Cisco Group Encrypted Transport VPN (GET VPN) feature of Cisco IOS Software and Cisco IOS XE Software could allow an authenticated, remote attacker who has administrative control of either a group member or a key server to execute arbitrary code on an affected device or cause the device to crash. This vulnerability is due to insufficient validation of attributes in the Group Domain of Interpretation (GDOI) and G-IKEv2 protocols of the GET VPN feature. An attacker could exploit this vulnerability by either compromising an installed key server or modifying the configuration of a group member to point to a key server that is controlled by the attacker. A successful exploit could allow the attacker to execute arbitrary code and gain full control of the affected system or cause the affected system to reload, resulting in a denial of service (DoS) condition. For more information, see the Details ["#details"] section of this advisory.
- Severity
- Medium
- CVSS
- 6.6 (3.1)
- Published
- 2023-09-27
- CISA KEV
- Known exploited
- Ecosystem
- operating-system
- Weaknesses
- CWE-787
Affected products
- cisco / ios / 12.4(22)md
- cisco / ios / 12.4(22)md1
- cisco / ios / 12.4(22)md2
- cisco / ios / 12.4(22)mda
- cisco / ios / 12.4(22)mda1
- cisco / ios / 12.4(22)mda2
Matched remediation archetype
Buffer bounds, memory safety, and memory corruption
This catalog composition supplies bounded fallback guidance. Explicitly reviewed curated workflows load with the complete record below.
Check exposure
- Identify affected native-code versions, build flags, architectures, parsers, codecs, drivers, and input paths in all shipped artifacts.
- Determine whether untrusted data reaches the affected routine and the process privilege, sandbox, and network exposure.
- Confirm statically linked, vendored, firmware, and platform-provided copies, not only package-manager records.
Remediate safely
- Apply the maintained upstream correction or replace the affected component, then rebuild every dependent artifact from clean inputs.
- Adopt bounds-checked interfaces, validated sizes and integer conversions, clear ownership, and memory-safe components where practical.
- Enable supported compiler and runtime hardening and add sanitized tests and fuzz regression seeds derived from non-weaponized fixtures.
Authoritative sources
Complete CVE record and remediation plan
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