CVE-2021-1447

Cisco Content Security Management Appliance Privilege Escalation Vulnerability

MEDIUM
6.7
CVSS Score
Published: May 6, 2021 at 12:40 PM UTC
Updated: June 17, 2026 at 03:31 AM UTC
1 product affected across 1 vendorContent Security Management Appliance

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Severity
MEDIUM6.7
Exploit prediction
EPSS 0.3%
SSVC
No known exploit

Description

A vulnerability in the user account management system of Cisco AsyncOS for Cisco Content Security Management Appliance (SMA) could allow an authenticated, local attacker to elevate their privileges to root. This vulnerability is due to a procedural flaw in the password generation algorithm. An attacker could exploit this vulnerability by enabling specific Administrator-only features and connecting to the appliance through the CLI with elevated privileges. A successful exploit could allow the attacker to execute arbitrary commands as root and access the underlying operating system. To exploit this vulnerability, the attacker must have valid Administrator credentials.

Affected

Our own answer: ranges merged, affected separated from platform-only, with confidence and review flags.

v < 12.8.1-00213.0.0-249 ≤ v < 13.8.1-068
Affected range stops below 12.8.1-002, so it looks safe — our inference, not a vendor statement
Affected range stops below 13.8.1-068, so it looks safe — our inference, not a vendor statement

Remediation

No guide yet

No remediation guidance has been written for this CVE yet. What the record does show:

SSVC — Action Prioritization

SSVCNo known exploitNot automatableTotal impact

SSVC signals action urgency (what to patch first), separate from CVSS which measures severity.

CVSS

6.7MEDIUMcisco
Attack Vector
LOCAL
Complexity
LOW
Privileges
HIGH
User Interaction
NONE
Scope
UNCHANGED
Confidentiality
HIGH
Integrity
HIGH
Availability
HIGH
Vector?

Quick Info

StatusMODIFIED
CWE
CWE-269

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