CVE-2021-25214

A broken inbound incremental zone update (IXFR) can cause named to terminate unexpectedly

Description

In BIND 9.8.5 -> 9.8.8, 9.9.3 -> 9.11.29, 9.12.0 -> 9.16.13, and versions BIND 9.9.3-S1 -> 9.11.29-S1 and 9.16.8-S1 -> 9.16.13-S1 of BIND 9 Supported Preview Edition, as well as release versions 9.17.0 -> 9.17.11 of the BIND 9.17 development branch, when a vulnerable version of named receives a malformed IXFR triggering the flaw described above, the named process will terminate due to a failed assertion the next time the transferred secondary zone is refreshed.

Remediation

Solution:

  • Upgrade to the patched release most closely related to your current version of BIND: BIND 9.11.31 BIND 9.16.15 BIND 9.17.12 BIND Supported Preview Edition is a special feature preview branch of BIND provided to eligible ISC support customers. BIND 9.11.31-S1 BIND 9.16.15-S1

Workaround:

  • Disabling incremental zone transfers (IXFR) by setting request-ixfr no; in the desired configuration block (options, zone, or server) prevents the failing assertion from being evaluated.

Category

6.5
CVSS
Severity: Medium
CVSS 3.1 •
CVSS 2.0 •
EPSS 0.64%
Vendor Advisory debian.org Vendor Advisory fedoraproject.org Vendor Advisory fedoraproject.org Vendor Advisory isc.org
Affected: ISC BIND9
Published at:
Updated at:

References

Frequently Asked Questions

What is the severity of CVE-2021-25214?
CVE-2021-25214 has been scored as a medium severity vulnerability.
How to fix CVE-2021-25214?
To fix CVE-2021-25214: Upgrade to the patched release most closely related to your current version of BIND: BIND 9.11.31 BIND 9.16.15 BIND 9.17.12 BIND Supported Preview Edition is a special feature preview branch of BIND provided to eligible ISC support customers. BIND 9.11.31-S1 BIND 9.16.15-S1
Is CVE-2021-25214 being actively exploited in the wild?
As for now, there are no information to confirm that CVE-2021-25214 is being actively exploited. According to its EPSS score, there is a ~1% probability that this vulnerability will be exploited by malicious actors in the next 30 days.
What software or system is affected by CVE-2021-25214?
CVE-2021-25214 affects ISC BIND9.
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