Detections
Analytics

Linux Distros Unpatched Vulnerability : CVE-2021-3695

medium Nessus Plugin ID 259582

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Synopsis

The Linux/Unix host has one or more packages installed with a vulnerability that the vendor indicates will not be patched.

Description

The Linux/Unix host has one or more packages installed that are impacted by a vulnerability without a vendor supplied patch available.

 - A crafted 16-bit grayscale PNG image may lead to a out-of-bounds write in the heap area. An attacker may take advantage of that to cause heap data corruption or eventually arbitrary code execution and circumvent secure boot protections. This issue has a high complexity to be exploited as an attacker needs to perform some triage over the heap layout to achieve signifcant results, also the values written into the memory are repeated three times in a row making difficult to produce valid payloads. This flaw affects grub2 versions prior grub-2.12. (CVE-2021-3695)

Note that Nessus relies on the presence of the package as reported by the vendor.

Solution

There is no known solution at this time.

See Also

https://ubuntu.com/security/CVE-2021-3695

Plugin Details

Severity: Medium

ID: 259582

File Name: unpatched_CVE_2021_3695.nasl

Version: 1.1

Type: local

Agent: unix

Family: Misc.

Published: 8/30/2025

Updated: 8/30/2025

Supported Sensors: Frictionless Assessment AWS, Frictionless Assessment Azure, Frictionless Assessment Agent, Nessus Agent, Agentless Assessment, Nessus

Risk Information

VPR

Risk Factor: Medium

Score: 4.2

CVSS v2

Risk Factor: Medium

Base Score: 4.4

Temporal Score: 3.3

Vector: CVSS2#AV:L/AC:M/Au:N/C:P/I:P/A:P

CVSS Score Source: CVE-2021-3695

CVSS v3

Risk Factor: Medium

Base Score: 4.5

Temporal Score: 3.9

Vector: CVSS:3.0/AV:L/AC:H/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:L/I:L/A:L

Temporal Vector: CVSS:3.0/E:U/RL:O/RC:C

Vulnerability Information

CPE: p-cpe:/a:canonical:ubuntu_linux:grub2-signed, cpe:/o:canonical:ubuntu_linux:16.04:-:lts, p-cpe:/a:canonical:ubuntu_linux:grub2-unsigned, cpe:/o:canonical:ubuntu_linux:14.04:-:lts

Required KB Items: Host/local_checks_enabled, Host/cpu, global_settings/vendor_unpatched, Host/OS/identifier

Exploit Ease: No known exploits are available

Vulnerability Publication Date: 6/16/2022

Reference Information

CVE: CVE-2021-3695