CVE-2021-21972
Actively exploited. CVE-2021-21972 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.
Public exploit code is available. Proof-of-concept or working exploit code for CVE-2021-21972 is indexed in Metasploit, Exploit-DB, GitHub PoC and Nuclei. Expect opportunistic scanning and exploitation attempts — prioritize remediation.
VMware vCenter Server vSphere Client contains a remote code execution vulnerability in a vCenter Server plugin which allows an attacker with network access to port 443 to execute commands with unrestricted privileges on the underlying operating system.
CSIRTS triage
- What
- VMware vCenter Server vSphere Client contains a remote code execution vulnerability in a vCenter Server plugin.
- Who is affected
- Deployments of VMware vCenter Server with network access to port 443.
- Urgency
- Remediation is urgent due to active exploitation and critical severity.
- Action
- Update to the latest version of VMware vCenter Server.
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 100% of all EPSS-scored CVEs.
Exploit availability
Public exploit or proof-of-concept code for CVE-2021-21972 is indexed in these free datasets. Available exploit code raises real-world risk independent of the CVSS score.
- MetasploitA Metasploit Framework module targets this CVE — weaponized, point-and-click exploitation.look it up ↗
- Exploit-DBA public exploit is published in the Exploit-DB archive.look it up ↗
- GitHub PoCPublic proof-of-concept repositories on GitHub reference this CVE.look it up ↗
- NucleiA nuclei-templates detection/PoC template exists for this CVE.look it up ↗
Advisory coverage (1)
- criticalexploitedCVE-2021-21972: VMware vCenter Server Remote Code Execution Vulnerabilitycisa-kev · 2021-11-03
External references
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[](https://www.csirts.com/cve/CVE-2021-21972)