# CVE-2012-3221: Denial of service in n/a

> Local attackers can cause a denial of service in Oracle VM VirtualBox via unspecified vectors related to core interrupt handling.

- **Severity:** Low 2.1 (`AV:L/AC:L/Au:N/C:N/I:N/A:P`)
- **Exploited in the wild:** Not known
- **Login needed:** Any signed-in user
- **Attackable:** Local or same network only
- **Victim action needed:** Not needed
- **Fix available:** Yes
- **Published:** 17 Oct 2012
- **Updated:** 6 Aug 2024
- **Also known as:** DSA-2594-1, GHSA-pxpj-94wm-p9ff

## What is CVE-2012-3221?

CVE-2012-3221 is a low-severity denial of service vulnerability in n/a, published on 17 Oct 2012. It can only be exploited from the same machine or local network, with no action from the victim.

### Official description

Unspecified vulnerability in the Oracle VM Virtual Box component in Oracle Virtualization 3.2, 4.0, and 4.1 allows local users to affect availability via unknown vectors related to VirtualBox Core.  NOTE: The previous information was obtained from the October 2012 CPU. Oracle has not commented on claims from another vendor that this issue is related to "incorrect interrupt handling."

## Which versions are affected by CVE-2012-3221?

It affects 1 product.


Products: Oracle Virtualization.

## How do I fix CVE-2012-3221?

Apply the vendor's patch.

## Is CVE-2012-3221 being exploited?

There is no known exploitation of CVE-2012-3221 in the wild and no public exploit code.

Public exploit code:

- Oracle VM VirtualBox 4.1 - Local Denial of Service (exploitdb)

## Other vulnerabilities in n/a

- [CVE-2013-3779](https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2013-3779/): Other in n/a (high 7.5)
- [CVE-2011-3538](https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2011-3538/): Auth bypass in n/a (medium 6.8)
- [CVE-2015-2581](https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2015-2581/): Other in n/a (medium 6.4)
- [CVE-2014-2439](https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2014-2439/): Other in n/a (medium 6.4)
- [CVE-2021-20191](https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2021-20191/): Insertion of Sensitive Information into Log File in ansible (medium 5.5)

## Fix prompt for AI coding agents

```text
Check this codebase for CVE-2012-3221 and fix it if it is affected.

What it is: CVE-2012-3221 is a low-severity denial of service vulnerability in n/a, published on 17 Oct 2012. It can only be exploited from the same machine or local network, with no action from the victim.
Exploitation: There is no known exploitation of CVE-2012-3221 in the wild and no public exploit code.

Affected product: n/a. No package-level version data is available, so check the vendor advisory linked from the reference page.

Task:
1. Search the dependency manifests and lockfiles (for example package.json, package-lock.json, requirements.txt, poetry.lock, uv.lock, pom.xml, build.gradle, go.mod, Cargo.lock, Gemfile.lock) and any Dockerfiles for the affected packages, including transitive dependencies.
2. If an affected version is in use, upgrade it to the fixed version for its release line with the project's package manager, so the lockfile is regenerated. Prefer the smallest upgrade that fixes it.
3. If there is no fix, or the upgrade would break the build, do not guess: explain the risk and the safest workaround instead.
4. Run the tests and summarise what changed and why.
5. If nothing in the project is affected, say so and change nothing.

Reference: https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2012-3221/ (Markdown: https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2012-3221/index.md)
```

## Sources

- CVE record: https://www.cve.org/CVERecord?id=CVE-2012-3221
- NVD: https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2012-3221
- OSV: https://osv.dev/vulnerability/CVE-2012-3221

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From sbomify Insights: https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2012-3221/
Summaries are generated and may contain mistakes; the official description above is the record.