# CVE-2021-26257: Denial of service in Intel(R) Wireless Bluetooth(R) and Killer(TM) Bluetooth(R) products

> An authenticated local attacker can cause a denial of service in Intel and Killer Bluetooth firmware due to improper buffer restrictions.

- **Severity:** Medium 5.5 (`CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:H`)
- **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:** No
- **Published:** 18 Aug 2022
- **Updated:** 5 May 2025
- **Also known as:** GHSA-x3gx-7gmp-75hw

## What is CVE-2021-26257?

CVE-2021-26257 is a medium-severity denial of service vulnerability in Intel(R) Wireless Bluetooth(R) and Killer(TM) Bluetooth(R) products, published on 18 Aug 2022. It can only be exploited from the same machine or local network, with no action from the victim.

### Official description

Improper buffer restrictions in firmware for some Intel(R) Wireless Bluetooth(R) and Killer(TM) Bluetooth(R) products before version 22.120 may allow an authenticated user to potentially enable denial of service via local access.

Weakness: CWE-119 (Improper Restriction of Operations within the Bounds of a Memory Buffer)

## Which versions are affected by CVE-2021-26257?

It affects 18 products.


Products: Intel Dual Band Wireless-Ac 3165 Firmware, Intel Dual Band Wireless-Ac 3168 Firmware, Intel Dual Band Wireless-Ac 8260 Firmware, Intel Dual Band Wireless-Ac 8265 Firmware, Intel Killer Wi-Fi 6 Ax1650 Firmware, Intel Killer Wi-Fi 6e Ax1675 Firmware, Intel Killer Wi-Fi 6e Ax1690 Firmware, Intel Killer Wireless-Ac 1550 Firmware, Intel Wi-Fi 6 Ax200 Firmware, Intel Wi-Fi 6 Ax201 Firmware, Intel Wi-Fi 6 Ax210 Firmware, Intel Wi-Fi 6 Ax211 Firmware, Intel Wi-Fi 6 Ax411 Firmware, Intel Wireless-Ac 9260 Firmware, Intel Wireless-Ac 9461 Firmware, Intel Wireless-Ac 9462 Firmware, Intel Wireless-Ac 9560 Firmware, Intel Wireless 7265 Firmware.

## How do I fix CVE-2021-26257?

No fix has been published for CVE-2021-26257 yet. Limit exposure of the affected software until one is available.

## Is CVE-2021-26257 being exploited?

There is no known exploitation of CVE-2021-26257 in the wild and no public exploit code.

## Other vulnerabilities in Intel(R) Wireless Bluetooth(R) and Killer(TM) Bluetooth(R) products

- [CVE-2020-12321](https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2020-12321/): Privilege escalation in Intel(R) Wireless Bluetooth(R) (high 8.8)
- [CVE-2019-11152](https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2019-11152/): Memory corruption in Intel(R) WIFI Drivers and Intel(R) PROSet/Wireless WiFi Software extension DLL (high 8.8)
- [CVE-2021-33847](https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2021-33847/): Memory corruption in Intel(R) Wireless Bluetooth(R) and Killer(TM) Bluetooth(R) products (high 7.8)
- [CVE-2019-11151](https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2019-11151/): Memory corruption in Intel(R) WIFI Drivers and Intel(R) PROSet/Wireless WiFi Software extension DLL (high 7.8)
- [CVE-2021-23179](https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2021-23179/): Information disclosure in Intel(R) Wireless Bluetooth(R) and Killer(TM) Bluetooth(R) products (high 7.1)

## Fix prompt for AI coding agents

```text
Check this codebase for CVE-2021-26257 and fix it if it is affected.

What it is: CVE-2021-26257 is a medium-severity denial of service vulnerability in Intel(R) Wireless Bluetooth(R) and Killer(TM) Bluetooth(R) products, published on 18 Aug 2022. 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-2021-26257 in the wild and no public exploit code.

Affected product: Intel(R) Wireless Bluetooth(R) and Killer(TM) Bluetooth(R) products. 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-2021-26257/ (Markdown: https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2021-26257/index.md)
```

## Sources

- CVE record: https://www.cve.org/CVERecord?id=CVE-2021-26257
- NVD: https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2021-26257
- OSV: https://osv.dev/vulnerability/CVE-2021-26257

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From sbomify Insights: https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2021-26257/
Summaries are generated and may contain mistakes; the official description above is the record.