CVE-2020-5379
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 · uneditedDell Inspiron 7352 BIOS versions prior to A12 contain a UEFI BIOS Boot Services overwrite vulnerability. A local attacker with access to system memory may exploit this vulnerability by overwriting the EFI_BOOT_SERVICES structure to execute arbitrary code in System Management Mode (SMM).
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 · high confidenceDell Inspiron 7352 BIOS versions prior to A12 contain a UEFI BIOS Boot Services overwrite vulnerability where a local attacker with access to system memory can overwrite the EFI_BOOT_SERVICES structure to achieve arbitrary code execution in System Management Mode (SMM), which runs at the highest privilege level below firmware.
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< a12CVSS 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
- Physical
- Complexity
- Low
- Privileges
- None
- User interaction
- None
- Scope
- Unchanged
- Confidentiality
- High
- Integrity
- High
- Availability
- High
CVSS:3.1/AV:P/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:H/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 checksWork through these to decide whether this CVE applies to you.
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Confirm system is Dell Inspiron 7352Run 'wmic computersystem get model' on Windows or 'dmidecode -s system-product-name' on Linux to identify the exact system modelAffected if The model is not exactly Inspiron 7352 - other Dell products are not affected by this specific CVE
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Check installed BIOS versionRun 'wmic bios get version' on Windows or 'dmidecode -s bios-version' on Linux to retrieve the current BIOS firmware versionAffected if The BIOS version cannot be determined or is lower than version A12 (for example, versions like A09, A10, or A11 are affected)
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Verify BIOS version format on Dell systemsDell BIOS versions typically follow a format like 'A12' or '1.x.x'; confirm the returned version matches Dell's version naming convention for this modelAffected if The installed version is prior to A12 according to alphanumeric comparison (A00-A11 are all affected)
You are affected if your system is a Dell Inspiron 7352 with a BIOS version lower than A12 - this is a firmware-level flaw in the UEFI BIOS code itself, not a configurable feature.
Generated from the published advisory. Verify against your own configuration.
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 dataUpdate Dell Inspiron 7352 BIOS to version A12 or later to patch the vulnerable EFI_BOOT_SERVICES structure. This is a firmware-level update requiring careful deployment due to the critical nature of SMM code execution.
- Consultation2.0 h
- Implementation3.0 h
- Testing2.0 h
- Review / QA1.0 h
An estimate, not a bill — we confirm scope with you before any work starts. Need it this week? Rush from $2,272.
Scan for this in your stack
Free · runs locallyCheck whether your project pulls in CVE-2020-5379 — or any other known-vulnerable package — straight from your lock files. Free and open source; it runs locally and uploads nothing.
References Go to the primary sourcePrimary sources — vendor advisories, patches and trackers. Where our summary and a reference disagree, the reference wins.
Primary sourcesPractitioner notes
ContributedPeer-ranked notes from engineers who’ve handled CVE-2020-5379 in production — separate from our analysis above.
The advisory tells you what broke. It rarely tells you what actually worked. If you’ve dealt with this one, that detail is what the next engineer is searching for.
- The version that genuinely resolved it — not the one the vendor claimed
- A config change or rule that shut the vector down
- A gotcha in the upgrade path that cost you an afternoon
No notes yet
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- 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
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