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CVE-2021-3156

Off-by-one Error

CVSS 3.1 High 7.8Known exploited (CISA KEV)

CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:H

Description

Sudo before 1.9.5p2 contains an off-by-one error that can result in a heap-based buffer overflow, which allows privilege escalation to root via "sudoedit -s" and a command-line argument that ends with a single backslash character.

Official description from the CVE record, published by mitre. Copyright © 1999-2026 The MITRE Corporation. See /security/cve/legal for the CVE license. View the record on cve.org

Key data

CVSS 3.1 High 7.8

Score published by CISA-ADP in the CVE record.

CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:H

  • Attack vector: Local

    The attacker needs local access to the system, or to trick a user into running something.

  • Attack complexity: Low

    No special conditions are needed. The attack can be repeated at will.

  • Privileges required: Low

    A basic user account is needed.

  • User interaction: None

    No action from any user is needed.

  • Scope: Unchanged

    The impact stays within the vulnerable component.

  • Confidentiality impact: High

    Serious or total effect on the secrecy of data.

  • Integrity impact: High

    Serious or total effect on the trustworthiness of data.

  • Availability impact: High

    Serious or total effect on availability.

CVSS is owned and managed by FIRST.Org, Inc. (FIRST) and is used by permission. Each CVSS score on this site is shown together with its vector string, as published in the CVE record by the source named next to it. Learn more at first.org/cvss.

EPSS

Exploit Prediction Scoring System by FIRST: an estimate of the probability that exploitation activity will be observed in the next 30 days.
Score
0.99962 (99.96% probability)
Percentile
99.97%
Scores of
Nov 10, 2026
Model
v2026.06.15

CISA Known Exploited Vulnerabilities

This CVE is listed in the CISA KEV catalog.
Name in the catalog
Sudo Heap-Based Buffer Overflow Vulnerability
Added to the catalog
Apr 6, 2022
Federal due date
Apr 27, 2022

CISA assessment as of Feb 3, 2025

Stakeholder-Specific Vulnerability Categorization (SSVC) decision points added by CISA.
Exploitation
Recorded by CISA as active
Automatable
no
Technical impact
total

Weakness (CWE)

CWE catalog version 5.0.
CWE names: Copyright © 2006-2026, The MITRE Corporation. See /security/cve/legal for the CWE license.

References

Links listed in the CVE record. They lead to other sites, which CubePath does not control.

Timeline

  1. ID reserved
  2. Record published
  3. Added to CISA KEV
  4. Record last updated

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About CubePath

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Data from the CVE Program (MITRE), CISA KEV and FIRST EPSS. CVSS is owned by FIRST and used by permission. Not affiliated with or endorsed by MITRE, CISA or FIRST. Data as of Nov 10, 2026, 19:51 UTC. Sources and licenses