CVE-2025-23240
Published: 04 March 2025
Summary
CVE-2025-23240 is a low-severity Out-of-bounds Write (CWE-787) vulnerability in Openatom Openharmony. Its CVSS base score is 3.8 (Low).
Operationally, exploitation aligns with the MITRE ATT&CK technique Exploitation for Privilege Escalation (T1068); ranked at the 28.8th 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).
Threat & Defense at a Glance
Threat & Defense Details
Mitigating Controls (NIST 800-53 r5)AI
Directly mandates timely identification, reporting, and correction of the specific out-of-bounds write flaw in OpenHarmony pre-installed apps to eliminate the vulnerability.
Implements memory protections like data execution prevention and address space randomization to block arbitrary code execution from out-of-bounds writes by local attackers.
Enforces least privilege on processes in pre-installed apps, limiting the scope and impact of arbitrary code execution achieved by low-privilege local attackers.
MITRE ATT&CK Enterprise TechniquesAI
Why these techniques?
Out-of-bounds write enabling local low-privileged arbitrary code execution directly facilitates exploitation for privilege escalation.
NVD Description
in OpenHarmony v5.0.2 and prior versions allow a local attacker arbitrary code execution in pre-installed apps through out-of-bounds write. This vulnerability can be exploited only in restricted scenarios.
Deeper analysisAI
CVE-2025-23240 is an out-of-bounds write vulnerability (CWE-787) affecting OpenHarmony versions v5.0.2 and prior. It enables a local attacker to achieve arbitrary code execution within pre-installed applications. The issue was publicly disclosed on 2025-03-04 with a CVSS v3.1 base score of 3.8 (AV:L/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:C/C:L/I:N/A:N), indicating low severity primarily due to its local attack vector and limited impact scope.
A local attacker with low privileges (PR:L) can exploit this vulnerability with low complexity and no user interaction required. Successful exploitation leads to arbitrary code execution confined to pre-installed apps, but only within restricted scenarios as noted in the description. The changed scope (S:C) allows potential impact beyond the vulnerable component, though confidentiality impact is low (C:L) with no integrity or availability effects.
For mitigation details, refer to the official OpenHarmony security disclosure advisory at https://gitee.com/openharmony/security/blob/master/zh/security-disclosure/2025/2025-03.md.
Details
- CWE(s)