CVE-2023-20168 Denial of service in Cisco NX-OS Software

What is CVE-2023-20168?

CVE-2023-20168 is a high-severity denial of service vulnerability in Cisco Nx-Os, published on 23 Aug 2023. It can only be exploited from the same machine or local network, with no action from the victim.

Official description

A vulnerability in TACACS+ and RADIUS remote authentication for Cisco NX-OS Software could allow an unauthenticated, local attacker to cause an affected device to unexpectedly reload. This vulnerability is due to incorrect input validation when processing an authentication attempt if the directed request option is enabled for TACACS+ or RADIUS. An attacker could exploit this vulnerability by entering a crafted string at the login prompt of an affected device. A successful exploit could allow the attacker to cause the affected device to unexpectedly reload, resulting in a denial of service (DoS) condition.

Weakness: CWE-20, CWE-120

Which versions are affected by CVE-2023-20168?

It affects 1 product.

Products include Cisco Nx-Os.

How do I fix CVE-2023-20168?

No fix has been published for CVE-2023-20168 yet. Limit exposure of the affected software until one is available.

Upgrade, then put limits on request size, rate and nesting depth so one client cannot exhaust the service. More about Denial of service.

Is CVE-2023-20168 being exploited?

There is no known exploitation of CVE-2023-20168 in the wild and no public exploit code.

Other vulnerabilities in Cisco Nx-Os

• CVE-2024-20399 Cisco NX-OS Command Injection Exploited Medium 6.0
• CVE-2021-1361 Cisco NX-OS Software Unauthenticated Arbitrary File Actions Vulnerability Critical 9.8
• CVE-2018-0301 Memory corruption in Cisco NX-OS unknown Critical 9.8
• CVE-2016-1453 Memory corruption in n/a Critical 9.8
• CVE-2016-1341 Hardcoded credentials in n/a Critical 9.8

All Cisco Nx-Os vulnerabilities

Sources

• CVE record
• NVD
• OSV
• GitHub advisory
• How this page is made

Also known as GHSA-fgh5-3xv7-c973.