CVE-2025-23281
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 · uneditedNVIDIA GPU Display Driver for Windows contains a vulnerability where an attacker with local unprivileged access that can win a race condition might be able to trigger a use-after-free error. A successful exploit of this vulnerability might lead to code execution, escalation of privileges, data tampering, denial of service, or information disclosure.
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 confidenceNVIDIA GPU Display Driver for Windows contains a race condition vulnerability that can be exploited by a local unprivileged attacker to trigger a use-after-free memory corruption. Successful exploitation may allow code execution, privilege escalation, data tampering, denial of service, or information disclosure.
Verify against the referenced sources before acting — the references below are authoritative for this CVE, this summary is not.
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
- High
- Privileges
- Low
- User interaction
- None
- Scope
- Unchanged
- Confidentiality
- High
- Integrity
- High
- Availability
- High
CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:H/PR:L/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 NVIDIA GPU driver is installedOpen Windows Device Manager, expand 'Display adapters', and verify an NVIDIA GPU is listed with a driver loaded. Alternatively, run 'nvidia-smi' from Command Prompt if available.Affected if No NVIDIA GPU with a Windows driver is present on the system
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Retrieve installed driver versionOpen Device Manager, right-click the NVIDIA GPU, select Properties, go to the Driver tab, and note the Driver Version field. Alternatively, run 'nvidia-smi' and read the 'Driver Version' field from the output.Affected if Unable to retrieve a driver version number from the NVIDIA GPU
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Compare driver version against affected rangeDocument the driver version number (for example, a string such as 536.99 or 555.XX). Consult NVIDIA's official security bulletin for CVE-2025-23281 to obtain the specific version range marked as vulnerable.Affected if The installed version falls within the range identified as vulnerable in the NVIDIA security advisory for this CVE
The system is affected if an NVIDIA GPU Display Driver for Windows is installed and its version falls within the vulnerable range specified by NVIDIA for this race condition flaw.
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 dataApply the vendor-supplied NVIDIA GPU driver patch as soon as possible. Until patched, minimize local unprivileged access to affected systems and monitor for suspicious processes attempting to win the race condition.
- Consultation2.0 h
- Implementation4.0 h
- Testing4.0 h
- Review / QA2.0 h
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Scan for this in your stack
Free · runs locallyCheck whether your project pulls in CVE-2025-23281 — 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-2025-23281 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
- No spam, self-promotion, credentials, or personal data