Security Resilience

CVE-2024-20141

Memory Safety in Google Android 12.0 … 15.0

Published
03 February 2025
Modified
03 February 2025
Patch / advisory
CVSS Score v3.1 6.6
Click a component to see what it means
Raw vectorCVSS:3.1/AV:P/AC:L/PR:N/UI:R/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:H
EPSS Score 0.0010 0.9th percentile
Risk Priority 45 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-2024-20141 is a medium-severity Write-what-where Condition (CWE-123) vulnerability in Google Android. Its CVSS base score is 6.6 (Medium).

Operationally, exploitation aligns with the MITRE ATT&CK technique Security Account Manager (T1003.002); ranked at the 0.9th 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 SI-16 (Memory Protection) — see the control section below for these in your framework.

EU & UK References

Vulnerability Data

In V5 DA, there is a possible out of bounds write due to a missing bounds check. This could lead to local escalation of privilege, if an attacker has physical access to the device, with no additional execution privileges needed.…

more

User interaction is needed for exploitation. Patch ID: ALPS09291402; Issue ID: MSV-2073.

CWE(s)

Related Threats

MITRE ATT&CK Enterprise Techniques

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.
T1003.003 NTDS Credential Access
Adversaries may attempt to access or create a copy of the Active Directory domain database in order to steal credential information, as well as obtain other information about domain members such as devices, users, and access rights.
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.
T1003.007 Proc Filesystem Credential Access
Adversaries may gather credentials from the proc filesystem or `/proc`.
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.
T1006 Direct Volume Access Stealth
Adversaries may directly access a volume to bypass file access controls and file system monitoring.
Derived from this CVE’s CWE(s) via the direct CWE→ATT&CK cross-walk.

CVEs Like This One

CVE-2025-20642Same product: Google Android
CVE-2024-20142Same product: Google Android
CVE-2025-20639Same product: Google Android
CVE-2025-20641Same product: Google Android
CVE-2024-20043Same product: Google Android
CVE-2024-20044Same product: Google Android
CVE-2024-20042Same product: Google Android
CVE-2023-32850Same product: Google Android
CVE-2023-32851Same product: Google Android
CVE-2023-20766Same product: Google Android

Affected Assets

google
android
12.0, 13.0, 14.0, 15.0

Mitigating Controls

Control response

Prevent
Stop it (NIST 800-53)

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Detect
Catch it (NIST detect / respond)

—

Harden
Shrink the surface (DISA STIG)
  • 3 hardening rules · 3 OS baselines
Validate
Prove the fix (OWASP ASVS)

—

Mitigating Controls (NIST 800-53 r5) AI

Developer testing and evaluation (including fuzzing and bounds checks) finds out-of-bounds write flaws before deployment.

Memory-protection mechanisms block unauthorized writes to arbitrary locations even if a write-what-where primitive exists.

Requiring documented secure-development standards and tools can mandate bounds-checked coding practices that avoid the weakness.

Secure engineering principles require memory-safe coding and bounds checking that eliminate the root cause of write-what-where flaws.

Process isolation confines the blast radius of an arbitrary write so it cannot affect other domains.

Input validation directly stops malformed data from triggering buffer overflows that produce arbitrary write-what-where conditions.

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

Vulnerability scanning and recording can discover out-of-bounds write flaws so they can be remediated.

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 prevent arbitrary write conditions via safe coding, bounds checking, and memory-safe constructs.

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.

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).

Oracle Linux 8 (1 rule)
  • V-248592 OL 8 must clear memory when it is freed to prevent use-after-free attacks. blocks CWE-123
RHEL 8 (1 rule)
  • V-230279 RHEL 8 must clear memory when it is freed to prevent use-after-free attacks. blocks CWE-123
Windows 10 (1 rule)
  • V-220727 Structured Exception Handling Overwrite Protection (SEHOP) must be enabled. blocks CWE-123

References