CVE-2023-49618
Published: 12 February 2025
Summary
CVE-2023-49618 is a high-severity Improper Restriction of Operations within the Bounds of a Memory Buffer (CWE-119) vulnerability in Intel (inferred from references). Its CVSS base score is 8.7 (High).
Operationally, exploitation aligns with the MITRE ATT&CK technique Exploitation for Privilege Escalation (T1068); ranked at the 19.9th 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-16 (Memory Protection) and SI-2 (Flaw Remediation).
Deeper analysis
CVE-2023-49618 involves improper buffer restrictions (CWE-119) in some Intel(R) System Security Report and System Resources Defense firmware. This vulnerability may allow a privileged user to potentially enable escalation of privilege via local access. It carries a CVSS v3.1 base score of 7.5, reflecting attack vector (AV:L), high attack complexity (AC:H), high privileges required (PR:H), no user interaction (UI:N), changed scope (S:C), and high impacts on confidentiality, integrity, and availability (C:H/I:H/A:H).
A privileged user with local access can exploit this vulnerability, though it requires high attack complexity. Successful exploitation could enable escalation of privilege, potentially leading to high-impact disruption across confidentiality, integrity, and availability with scope expansion beyond the vulnerable component.
Intel has issued security advisory INTEL-SA-01203 addressing this issue, available at https://intel.com/content/www/us/en/security-center/advisory/intel-sa-01203.html, which provides details on affected products and mitigation steps.
EU & UK References
- 🇪🇺 ENISA EUVD: EUVD-2023-53562
Vulnerability details
Improper buffer restrictions in some Intel(R) System Security Report and System Resources Defense firmware may allow a privileged user to potentially enable escalation of privilege via local access.
- CWE(s)
Related Threats
MITRE ATT&CK Enterprise TechniquesAI
Why these techniques?
Local memory corruption vulnerability in firmware directly enables exploitation to achieve privilege escalation from an already-privileged local context.
CVEs Like This One
Affected Assets
Mitigating Controls
Mitigating Controls (NIST 800-53 r5) AI
Directly remediates the improper buffer restrictions in Intel firmware by identifying, testing, and applying vendor patches as specified in INTEL-SA-01203.
Implements memory protections such as non-executable memory regions and address space layout randomization to block exploitation of buffer overflows leading to privilege escalation.
Enforces least privilege to restrict the scope of privileges held by local privileged users, thereby limiting the potential impact of escalation via this firmware vulnerability.