CVE-2021-1285
Multiple Cisco Products SNORT Ethernet Frame Decoder Denial of Service Vulnerability
Multiple Cisco products are affected by a vulnerability in the Ethernet Frame Decoder of the Snort detection engine that could allow an unauthenticated, adjacent attacker to cause a denial of service (DoS) condition. The vulnerability is due to improper handling of error conditions when processing Ethernet frames. An attacker could exploit this vulnerability by sending malicious Ethernet frames through an affected device. A successful exploit could allow the attacker to exhaust disk space on the affected device, which could result in administrators being unable to log in to the device or the device being unable to boot up correctly.Note: Manual intervention is required to recover from this situation. Customers are advised to contact the Cisco Technical Assistance Center (TAC) to help recover a device in this condition.Cisco has released software updates that address this vulnerability. There are no workarounds that address this vulnerability.
Attack profile
How easy it is to exploit
- Attack vector
- Adjacent network
- Complexity
- Low
- Privileges needed
- None
- User interaction
- None
What an attacker can affect
- Confidentiality
- None
- Integrity
- None
- Availability
- High
Exploit likelihood
What each source reports
CVE List Score used
7.4
Multiple Cisco Products SNORT Ethernet Frame Decoder Denial of Service Vulnerability
Multiple Cisco products are affected by a vulnerability in the Ethernet Frame Decoder of the Snort detection engine that could allow an unauthenticated, adjacent attacker to cause a denial of service (DoS) condition. The vulnerability is due to improper handling of error conditions when processing Ethernet frames. An attacker could exploit this vulnerability by sending malicious Ethernet frames through an affected device. A successful exploit could allow the attacker to exhaust disk space on the affected device, which could result in administrators being unable to log in to the device or the device being unable to boot up correctly.Note: Manual intervention is required to recover from this situation. Customers are advised to contact the Cisco Technical Assistance Center (TAC) to help recover a device in this condition.Cisco has released software updates that address this vulnerability. There are no workarounds that address this vulnerability.
- Record
CVE-2021-1285- CVSS 3.0
- 7.4 High
CVSS:3.0/AV:A/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:C/C:N/I:N/A:H/E:X/RL:X/RC:X - Weakness
- CWE-770
- Updated
- 2026-11-02
EUVDEUVD-2021-6752
7.4
Multiple Cisco products are affected by a vulnerability in the Ethernet Frame Decoder of the Snort detection engine that could allow an unauthenticated, adjacent attacker to cause a denial of service (DoS) condition. The vulnerability is due to improper handling of error conditions when processing Ethernet frames. An attacker could exploit this vulnerability by sending malicious Ethernet frames through an affected device. A successful exploit could allow the attacker to exhaust disk space on the affected device, which could result in administrators being unable to log in to the device or the device being unable to boot up correctly.Note: Manual intervention is required to recover from this situation. Customers are advised to contact the Cisco Technical Assistance Center (TAC) to help recover a device in this condition.Cisco has released software updates that address this vulnerability. There are no workarounds that address this vulnerability.
- Record
EUVD-2021-6752- CVSS 3.0
- 7.4 High
CVSS:3.0/AV:A/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:C/C:N/I:N/A:H/E:X/RL:X/RC:X - Updated
- 2026-11-03
GitHub AdvisoriesGHSA-278j-256r-v8r4
7.4
Multiple Cisco products are affected by a vulnerability in the Ethernet Frame Decoder of the...
Multiple Cisco products are affected by a vulnerability in the Ethernet Frame Decoder of the Snort detection engine that could allow an unauthenticated, adjacent attacker to cause a denial of service (DoS) condition. The vulnerability is due to improper handling of error conditions when processing Ethernet frames. An attacker could exploit this vulnerability by sending malicious Ethernet frames through an affected device. A successful exploit could allow the attacker to exhaust disk space on the affected device, which could result in administrators being unable to log in to the device or the device being unable to boot up correctly.Note: Manual intervention is required to recover from this situation. Customers are advised to contact the Cisco Technical Assistance Center (TAC) to help recover a device in this condition.Cisco has released software updates that address this vulnerability. There are no workarounds that address this vulnerability.
- Record
GHSA-278j-256r-v8r4- CVSS 3.0
- 7.4 High
CVSS:3.0/AV:A/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:C/C:N/I:N/A:H - Weakness
- CWE-770
- Updated
- 2026-11-02
NVD
7.4
Multiple Cisco products are affected by a vulnerability in the Ethernet Frame Decoder of the Snort detection engine that could allow an unauthenticated, adjacent attacker to cause a denial of service (DoS) condition. The vulnerability is due to improper handling of error conditions when processing Ethernet frames. An attacker could exploit this vulnerability by sending malicious Ethernet frames through an affected device. A successful exploit could allow the attacker to exhaust disk space on the affected device, which could result in administrators being unable to log in to the device or the device being unable to boot up correctly.Note: Manual intervention is required to recover from this situation. Customers are advised to contact the Cisco Technical Assistance Center (TAC) to help recover a device in this condition.Cisco has released software updates that address this vulnerability. There are no workarounds that address this vulnerability.
- Record
CVE-2021-1285- CVSS 3.0
- 7.4 High
CVSS:3.0/AV:A/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:C/C:N/I:N/A:H - Weakness
- CWE-770
- Updated
- 2026-11-02
Affected products
History
| Recorded | Changed | Sources |
|---|---|---|
| aliases, published | EUVD | |
| first indexed | CVE List, GitHub Advisories, NVD |
Dates are when Every CVE recorded each change. Upstream dates may differ.
In short
CVE-2021-1285 is a high vulnerability (CVSS 7.4) in Cisco Utd Snort Ips Engine Software, published November 18, 2024. No source lists public exploit code. EPSS puts the chance of exploitation in the next 30 days at 2.94%, the 87th percentile. No source names a fixed version.