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iOSOperating system · Cisco

CVE-2013-1217

MEDIUM · 6.8 CVSS v2.0 Published 2013-04-24
Mitigation only
No fix yet — a mitigation exists. There is no fixed release. A documented workaround reduces exposure in the meantime.
See remediation →
74/100
Remediation priority · Elevated
Remotely reachable Zero-click

Official description Straight from the sourceThe vendor's or NVD's own wording, published unedited. Authoritative, but often terse — it says what broke, rarely what to do.

NVD · unedited
The generic input/output control implementation in Cisco IOS does not properly manage buffers, which allows remote authenticated users to cause a denial of service (device reload) by sending many SNMP requests at the same time, aka Bug ID CSCub41105.

Technical summary Written by usOur analysis, written from the advisory, the CVSS vector and the affected-version data. It adds context the advisory leaves out, and never invents facts that are not in the source.

dbcve analysis · moderate confidence

Cisco IOS contains a buffer management flaw in its generic input/output control implementation. Remote authenticated users can trigger a denial of service by sending numerous concurrent SNMP requests, causing the device to reload unexpectedly.

MitigationRestrict SNMP access to trusted management stations via ACLs, implement rate-limiting on SNMP, and apply the relevant Cisco IOS patch or upgrade to a fixed version.

Verify against the referenced sources before acting — the references below are authoritative for this CVE, this summary is not.

Affected products & versions What the vendor confirmedThe version ranges the vendor confirmed as vulnerable. If your version sits inside a range here, treat yourself as exposed until you have upgraded.

NVD · CPE data
iOSOperating system
Affected:all versions

CVSS breakdown How the score is builtThe industry scoring standard. It rates how the flaw is reached, what it takes to exploit, and what an attacker gains — the score is derived from those, not the other way round.

From the vector
Attack vector
Network
Complexity
Low
Authentication
Single
Confidentiality
None
Integrity
None
Availability
Complete

AV:N/AC:L/Au:S/C:N/I:N/A:C

Am I affected? How to checkSteps we derive from the advisory and the affected-version data, so you can decide whether this CVE reaches your setup. They are a guide, not a scan — your own configuration is the authority.

dbcve checks

Work through these to decide whether this CVE applies to you.

  1. Identify the device OS and version
    Execute 'show version' on the device CLI to confirm it runs Cisco IOS and note the exact version string
    Affected if The device runs Cisco IOS (any version, as all are affected per the CVE) and the version matches the product scope
  2. Verify SNMP is enabled on the device
    Execute 'show snmp' to display SNMP engine status and configuration summary
    Affected if SNMP is listed as enabled with an active engine ID and statistics showing recent activity
  3. Check SNMP community string configuration
    Execute 'show snmp community' to list configured community strings and their access rights
    Affected if Any SNMP community strings are configured, indicating SNMP access is active
  4. Inspect SNMP access control lists
    Execute 'show access-lists' and correlate with SNMP configuration to identify which source IPs or networks can reach SNMP
    Affected if SNMP is accessible from untrusted or broad network ranges (0.0.0.0/0 or non-management subnets)
  5. Confirm SNMP service binding to interfaces
    Check interface configurations or execute 'show snmp mib' to see which interfaces process SNMP traffic
    Affected if SNMP is bound to any interface reachable from untrusted network segments

You are affected if your Cisco IOS device has SNMP enabled and SNMP traffic from untrusted sources can reach the device, since the vulnerability triggers via concurrent SNMP requests causing device reload.

Generated from the published advisory. Verify against your own configuration.

Check your environment

Paste your version and any relevant configuration and it will be compared against the affected criteria above. Do not include secrets or credentials.

AI-assisted, checked against the advisory. Informational, not a guarantee.

Remediation Closing itWhat it takes to close this. Where a vendor fix exists we point at it; where none exists we say so plainly, and can build one. Effort estimates are scoped from the advisory, not from your codebase.

From vendor data
Mitigation available No clean upgrade yet — mitigate in the meantime
Mitigation

Restrict SNMP access to trusted management stations via ACLs, implement rate-limiting on SNMP, and apply the relevant Cisco IOS patch or upgrade to a fixed version.

Fix this in iOS Scoped from the published advisory
  • Consultation4.0 h
  • Implementation8.0 h
  • Testing4.0 h
  • Review / QA2.0 h
18.0 hours of engineering $3,200
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Scan for this in your stack

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References Go to the primary sourcePrimary sources — vendor advisories, patches and trackers. Where our summary and a reference disagree, the reference wins.

Primary sources

Practitioner notes

Contributed

Peer-ranked notes from engineers who’ve handled CVE-2013-1217 in production — separate from our analysis above.

No notes yet

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What this is

A place for practitioners to share what actually worked: a mitigation you’ve tested, a configuration change, a version- or environment-specific caveat, or a link to a verified patch. The most useful notes rise to the top as peers upvote them, so the signal stays high.

What belongs here
  • Verified mitigations, workarounds, and config changes
  • Version or environment caveats, and links to real fixes
  • No weaponised exploit code, or anything meant to cause harm
  • No spam, self-promotion, credentials, or personal data