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700 Series FirmwareOperating system · Hp

CVE-2016-2243

HIGH · 7.9 CVSS v3.0 Published 2016-03-04
Mitigation only
No fix yet — a mitigation exists. There is no fixed release. A documented workaround reduces exposure in the meantime.
See remediation →
81/100
Remediation priority · High
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
Sure Start on HP Commercial PCs 2015 allows local users to cause a denial of service (BIOS recovery failure) by leveraging administrative access.

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

HP Sure Start (a BIOS self-healing protection technology) on HP Commercial PCs from 2015 contains a vulnerability where a local user with administrative privileges can deliberately cause BIOS recovery failure, effectively denying the system the ability to recover from BIOS corruption and potentially leaving the system in a non-functional state.

MitigationRestrict physical and administrative access to affected systems; implement monitoring for suspicious BIOS/boot manipulation; contact HP for firmware updates if available; ensure robust backup and recovery procedures are in place.

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
700 Series FirmwareOperating system
Affected:= 1.08= 2.09= 2.05= 1.05= 2.07
800 Series FirmwareOperating system
Affected:= 2.09= 2.1
Z240 FirmwareOperating system
Affected:= 1.11
Z238 FirmwareOperating system
Affected:= 1.11
Zbook FirmwareOperating system
Affected:= 1.03= 1.04
1000 Series FirmwareOperating system
Affected:= 1.04= 1.1= 1.01
Elitebook Folio 1012 X2 G2Hardware / appliance
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
Local
Complexity
Low
Privileges
High
User interaction
None
Scope
Changed
Confidentiality
None
Integrity
High
Availability
High

CVSS:3.0/AV:L/AC:L/PR:H/UI:N/S:C/C:N/I:H/A:H

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 system model and confirm it is an HP Commercial PC from 2015
    Check the system information via 'msinfo32' or 'systeminfo' command, or physically inspect the machine label. Look for model names matching: HP 700 Series, HP 800 Series, HP Z240, HP Z238, HP Zbook, HP 1000 Series, or HP Elitebook Folio 1012 X2 G2.
    Affected if The system model matches one of the listed affected product families.
  2. Check the BIOS firmware version
    Enter BIOS setup (F10 during boot) and navigate to the 'BIOS Version' or 'Main' page, or use 'wmic bios get smbiosbiosversion' command from an elevated command prompt.
    Affected if The installed BIOS firmware version matches any of these: HP 700 Series: 1.08, 2.09, 2.05, 1.05, 2.07; HP 800 Series: 2.09, 2.1; HP Z240: 1.11; HP Z238: 1.11; HP Zbook: 1.03, 1.04; HP 1000 Series: 1.04, 1.1, 1.01; HP Elitebook Folio 1012 X2 G2: any version.
  3. Verify HP Sure Start is enabled
    Enter BIOS setup (F10 during boot) and look for 'Sure Start' or 'BIOS Self-Heal' settings under the 'Security' or 'Advanced' menu. Alternatively, check HP Support Assistant for Sure Start status.
    Affected if HP Sure Start technology is present and configured on the system.
  4. Confirm administrative access context
    Review local user accounts and group memberships using 'lusrmgr.msc' or 'net user' command to identify users with local administrative privileges.
    Affected if Multiple local administrative accounts exist, or standard users have administrative rights, providing potential vectors for the described abuse.

A user is affected if they own a 2015 HP Commercial PC from the listed product families with a matching firmware version and HP Sure Start is present, where a local administrator could intentionally trigger recovery failure.

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 physical and administrative access to affected systems; implement monitoring for suspicious BIOS/boot manipulation; contact HP for firmware updates if available; ensure robust backup and recovery procedures are in place.

Fix this in 700 Series Firmware Scoped from the published advisory
  • Consultation4.0 h
  • Implementation8.0 h
  • Testing6.0 h
  • Review / QA4.0 h
22.0 hours of engineering $3,860
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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-2016-2243 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
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