Security Resilience

CVE-2023-33033

Memory Safety in Qualcomm Snapdragon 8C Compute Platform Firmware

Memory Safety
Published
02 January 2024
Modified
21 November 2024
Patch / advisory
View advisory
CVSS Score v3.1 8.4
Click a component to see what it means
Raw vectorCVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:H
EPSS Score 0.0012 2th percentile
Risk Priority 58 floored blend · peak EPSS

CVSS and EPSS are reproduced from their sources (NVD, FIRST EPSS). Risk Priority is our own derived reading, not an NVD score.

Summary

CVE-2023-33033 is a high-severity Use of Out-of-range Pointer Offset (CWE-823) vulnerability in Qualcomm Snapdragon 8C Compute Platform Firmware. Its CVSS base score is 8.4 (High).

Operationally, exploitation aligns with the MITRE ATT&CK technique Data Obfuscation (T1001); ranked at the 2th percentile by exploit likelihood (below the median); it is not currently listed in the CISA KEV catalog.

The strongest mitigations our analysis identified map to SA-11 (Developer Testing and Evaluation) and SA-15 (Development Process, Standards, and Tools) — see the control section below for these in your framework.

EU & UK References

Vulnerability Data

Memory corruption in Audio during playback with speaker protection.

CWE(s)
CWE-823CWE-787

Related Threats

MITRE ATT&CK Enterprise Techniques

T1001 Data Obfuscation Command And Control
Adversaries may obfuscate command and control traffic to make it more difficult to detect.
attack.mitre.org →
T1001.001 Junk Data Command And Control
Adversaries may add junk data to protocols used for command and control to make detection more difficult.
attack.mitre.org →
T1003.002 Security Account Manager Credential Access
Adversaries may attempt to extract credential material from the Security Account Manager (SAM) database either through in-memory techniques or through the Windows Registry where the SAM database is stored.
attack.mitre.org →
T1003.004 LSA Secrets Credential Access
Adversaries with SYSTEM access to a host may attempt to access Local Security Authority (LSA) secrets, which can contain a variety of different credential materials, such as credentials for service accounts.
attack.mitre.org →
T1003.008 /etc/passwd and /etc/shadow Credential Access
Adversaries may attempt to dump the contents of <code>/etc/passwd</code> and <code>/etc/shadow</code> to enable offline password cracking.
attack.mitre.org →
T1006 Direct Volume Access Stealth
Adversaries may directly access a volume to bypass file access controls and file system monitoring.
attack.mitre.org →
Derived from this CVE’s CWE(s) via the direct CWE→ATT&CK cross-walk.

CVEs Like This One

CVE-2023-22388Same product: Qualcomm 315 5G Iot Modem
CVE-2023-43513Same product: Qualcomm 315 5G Iot Modem
CVE-2023-33030Same product: Qualcomm 315 5G Iot Modem
CVE-2023-33066Same product: Qualcomm 315 5G Iot Modem
CVE-2023-28551Same product: Qualcomm 315 5G Iot Modem
CVE-2023-33067Same product: Qualcomm 9206 Lte Modem
CVE-2023-28550Same product: Qualcomm 315 5G Iot Modem
CVE-2023-28564Same product: Qualcomm Aqt1000
CVE-2023-33038Same product: Qualcomm 315 5G Iot Modem
CVE-2023-28558Same product: Qualcomm 315 5G Iot Modem

Affected Assets

qualcomm
315 5g iot modem firmware
all versions
qualcomm
9205 lte modem firmware
all versions
qualcomm
9206 lte modem firmware
all versions
qualcomm
9207 lte modem firmware
all versions
qualcomm
apq8017 firmware
all versions
qualcomm
apq8037 firmware
all versions
qualcomm
apq8064au firmware
all versions
qualcomm
apq8076 firmware
all versions
qualcomm
apq8084 firmware
all versions
qualcomm
aqt1000 firmware
all versions
+254 more product configuration(s) — see NVD for full list

Mitigating Controls

Control response

Prevent
Stop it (NIST 800-53)

—

Detect
Catch it (NIST detect / respond)

—

Harden
Shrink the surface (DISA STIG)
  • 1 hardening rule · 1 OS baseline
Validate
Prove the fix (OWASP ASVS)
  • V1.4.1

Mitigating Controls (NIST 800-53 r5) AI

SA-11 Developer Testing and Evaluation good match

Developer testing and evaluation (including static analysis and fuzzing) directly finds unsafe pointer arithmetic before deployment.

SA-15 Development Process, Standards, and Tools partial match

Requiring documented development standards and tools can mandate safe pointer usage and compiler/runtime checks that stop the weakness from being introduced.

SA-8 Security and Privacy Engineering Principles partial match

Security engineering principles can require bounds-checked pointer arithmetic or safe language constructs that structurally avoid out-of-range offsets.

SC-39 Process Isolation partial match

Process isolation confines damage from invalid pointer offsets to a single address space, reducing overall impact.

SI-10 Information Input Validation partial match

Input validation can structurally reject or sanitize data that would otherwise trigger an out-of-bounds write.

SI-16 Memory Protection partial match

Memory-protection controls limit the blast radius of an out-of-range pointer dereference without preventing or detecting the coding error itself.

Mitigating Controls (NIST CSF 2.0) AI

Derived directly from the weakness types (CWEs) cited in the NVD entry via our AI-authored CWE→CSF cross-walk (authority under review) — links open the control.

ID.RA-01 partial match
blocks

SAST/DAST tools used for vulnerability identification can surface this class of coding defect.

PR.PS-02 partial match
blocks

Patching or replacing vulnerable software directly eliminates known instances of this coding weakness.

PR.PS-06 partial match
blocks

Secure SDLC practices directly require bounds-checked pointer arithmetic and static analysis to prevent out-of-range offsets.

Mitigating Controls (ISO/IEC 27001:2022 Annex A) AI

Derived directly from the weakness types (CWEs) cited in the NVD entry via our AI-authored CWE→ISO cross-walk (authority under review) — links open the control.

A.5.14 Information transfer partial match
removes
A.5.15 Access control partial match
removes
A.5.16 Identity management partial match
removes
A.5.17 Authentication information partial match
removes
A.5.18 Access rights partial match
removes
A.7.2 Physical entry partial match
removes

Hardening callouts derived

Configuration rules from DISA STIG baselines that bear on weaknesses of the type cited by this CVE. Each rule is shown with the relationship its mapping actually records, against the CWE it was authored against. Derived via CVE→CWE over `controls_xwalks` (higher-evidence rows only; rows rated `none` are excluded).

Windows 10 (1 rule)
  • V-220726 Data Execution Prevention (DEP) must be configured to at least OptOut. blocks CWE-823

References