# CVE-2016-4962: Privilege escalation in n/a

> Local guest administrators can escalate privileges to the host OS or cause denial of service by manipulating xenstore data in Xen hypervisor.

- **Severity:** Medium 6.7 (`CVSS:3.0/AV:L/AC:L/PR:H/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:H`)
- **Exploited in the wild:** Not known
- **Login needed:** An administrator
- **Attackable:** Local or same network only
- **Victim action needed:** Not needed
- **Fix available:** Yes
- **Published:** 7 Jun 2016
- **Updated:** 6 Aug 2024
- **Also known as:** DEBIAN-CVE-2016-4962, GHSA-42rm-gcmp-3557, UBUNTU-CVE-2016-4962

## What is CVE-2016-4962?

CVE-2016-4962 is a medium-severity vulnerability in Xen Xen, published on 7 Jun 2016. It can only be exploited from the same machine or local network, with no action from the victim.

### Official description

The libxl device-handling in Xen 4.6.x and earlier allows local OS guest administrators to cause a denial of service (resource consumption or management facility confusion) or gain host OS privileges by manipulating information in guest controlled areas of xenstore.

Weakness: CWE-264

## Which versions are affected by CVE-2016-4962?

It affects 2 products.


Products: Oracle Vm Server, Xen Xen.

## How do I fix CVE-2016-4962?

Apply the vendor's patch.

## Is CVE-2016-4962 being exploited?

There is no known exploitation of CVE-2016-4962 in the wild and no public exploit code.

## Other vulnerabilities in Xen Xen

- [CVE-2016-4480](https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2016-4480/): Privilege escalation in n/a (high 8.4)
- [CVE-2017-3242](https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2017-3242/): Denial of service in LDOMS (medium 5.9)
- [CVE-2015-0452](https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2015-0452/): Information disclosure in n/a (medium 4.3)
- [CVE-2020-2571](https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2020-2571/): Missing authorization in LDOMS (low 3.3)

## Fix prompt for AI coding agents

```text
Check this codebase for CVE-2016-4962 and fix it if it is affected.

What it is: CVE-2016-4962 is a medium-severity vulnerability in Xen Xen, published on 7 Jun 2016. 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-2016-4962 in the wild and no public exploit code.

Affected product: Xen Xen. 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-2016-4962/ (Markdown: https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2016-4962/index.md)
```

## Sources

- CVE record: https://www.cve.org/CVERecord?id=CVE-2016-4962
- NVD: https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2016-4962
- OSV: https://osv.dev/vulnerability/CVE-2016-4962

---
From sbomify Insights: https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2016-4962/
Summaries are generated and may contain mistakes; the official description above is the record.