Baseboard Management Controller FirmwareOperating system · Intel

CVE-2019-11178

HIGH · 8.1 CVSS v3.1 Published 2019-11-14
Fix available
A fix is available. Upgrade to 2.18 or later.
See remediation →
87/100
Remediation priority · High
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
Stack overflow in Intel(R) Baseboard Management Controller firmware may allow an authenticated user to potentially enable information disclosure and/or denial of service via network 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

Stack overflow vulnerability in Intel Baseboard Management Controller (BMC) firmware allows an authenticated user to exploit via network access, potentially leading to information disclosure and denial of service conditions.

MitigationApply Intel firmware updates for affected BMCs when available; otherwise, restrict BMC network access to trusted administrators via network segmentation and implement strong authentication controls.

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
Baseboard Management Controller FirmwareOperating system
Affected:< 2.18

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
Privileges
Low
User interaction
None
Scope
Unchanged
Confidentiality
High
Integrity
None
Availability
High

CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:N/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 Intel BMC presence
    Check for BMC by accessing IPMI at 623/UDP port or running 'ipmitool -I lanplus -H <bmc-ip> mc info' or checking BMC web interface
    Affected if No Intel BMC is present in the environment
  2. Check BMC firmware version
    Run 'ipmitool -I lanplus -H <bmc-ip> -U <user> -P <pass> mc info' or access BMC web interface under Firmware/Info section to retrieve the firmware version
    Affected if Firmware version is below 2.18 (versions like 2.17, 2.16, earlier releases)
  3. Verify BMC network accessibility
    Test if UDP port 623 is open and reachable on the BMC IP address using 'nc -u -z <bmc-ip> 623' or nmap scan
    Affected if BMC is directly accessible from untrusted networks or the internet
  4. Confirm authentication is required
    Attempt an authenticated IPMI session with valid credentials or verify that anonymous/null sessions are disabled via 'ipmitool -I lanplus -H <bmc-ip> user list'
    Affected if Authentication is not enforced or weak/default credentials are in use

User is affected if Intel BMC firmware version is below 2.18 AND the BMC is network-accessible with authentication enabled but exploitable via the stack overflow vulnerability.

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
Upgrade available Upgrade to 2.18 or later
Fixed in 2.18
Interim mitigation

Apply Intel firmware updates for affected BMCs when available; otherwise, restrict BMC network access to trusted administrators via network segmentation and implement strong authentication controls.

Fix this in Baseboard Management Controller Firmware Scoped from the published advisory
  • Consultation8.0 h
  • Implementation12.0 h
  • Testing6.0 h
  • Review / QA4.0 h
30.0 hours of engineering $5,380
Get the upgrade done

An estimate, not a bill — we confirm scope with you before any work starts. Need it this week? Rush from $8,608.

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-2019-11178 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