CVE-2023-31342
Published: 11 February 2025
Summary
CVE-2023-31342 is a high-severity Insufficient Granularity of Access Control (CWE-1220) vulnerability in Amd (inferred from references). Its CVSS base score is 7.5 (High).
Operationally, exploitation aligns with the MITRE ATT&CK technique Exploitation for Privilege Escalation (T1068); ranked at the 13.9th percentile by exploit likelihood (below the median); it is not currently listed in the CISA KEV catalog.
The strongest mitigations our analysis identified are NIST 800-53 SI-10 (Information Input Validation) and SI-16 (Memory Protection).
Deeper analysis
CVE-2023-31342 involves improper input validation in the SMM handler, which may allow a privileged attacker to overwrite SMRAM and potentially achieve arbitrary code execution. This vulnerability, associated with CWE-1220, affects AMD systems and was published on 2025-02-11 with a CVSS v3.1 base score of 7.5 (AV:L/AC:H/PR:H/UI:N/S:C/C:H/I:H/A:H).
A local attacker with high privileges can exploit this issue through a high-complexity attack that requires no user interaction. Exploitation enables overwriting of SMRAM, leading to arbitrary code execution with high impacts on confidentiality, integrity, and availability, along with a change in scope.
AMD has addressed this vulnerability in Security Bulletins SB-3009, SB-4008, and SB-5004, which provide details on mitigations and patches.
EU & UK References
- 🇪🇺 ENISA EUVD: EUVD-2023-35653
Vulnerability details
Improper input validation in the SMM handler may allow a privileged attacker to overwrite SMRAM, potentially leading to arbitrary code execution.
- CWE(s)
Related Threats
MITRE ATT&CK Enterprise TechniquesAI
Why these techniques?
SMM handler input validation flaw directly enables local privileged arbitrary code execution at ring -2, facilitating firmware-level privilege escalation and bootkit-style persistence via SMRAM overwrite.
CVEs Like This One
Affected Assets
Mitigating Controls
Mitigating Controls (NIST 800-53 r5) AI
Directly addresses the improper input validation in the SMM handler that enables SMRAM overwrite by enforcing validation at interfaces.
Ensures timely remediation of the specific flaw in the SMM handler via AMD patches, preventing exploitation.
Protects SMRAM from unauthorized access and modification by implementing memory safeguards against privileged attacker overwrites.