CVE-2020-3118
Actively exploited. CVE-2020-3118 is listed in the CISA Known Exploited Vulnerabilities catalog (added 2021-11-03) — exploitation has been observed in the wild, and US federal agencies are required to remediate it under BOD 22-01. Treat patching as urgent.
Cisco IOS XR improperly validates string input from certain fields in Cisco Discovery Protocol messages. Exploitation could allow an unauthenticated, adjacent attacker to execute code with administrative privileges or cause a reload on an affected device.
CSIRTS triage
- What
- Cisco IOS XR improperly validates string input from certain fields in Cisco Discovery Protocol messages, allowing code execution.
- Who is affected
- Affected devices running Cisco IOS XR.
- Urgency
- Urgent remediation is required due to active exploitation and critical severity.
- Action
- Update to the latest version of Cisco IOS XR.
AI-assisted analysis generated from the source advisory — verify against the original.
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Exploitation outlook
- Exploitation confirmedAlready exploited in the wild (CISA KEV) — the prediction phase is over. Patch now. Riskier than 96% of all EPSS-scored CVEs.
Advisory coverage (1)
- criticalexploitedCVE-2020-3118: Cisco IOS XR Software Discovery Protocol Format String Vulnerabilitycisa-kev · 2021-11-03
External references
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