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CVE-2021-44142

Exploitation: none CVSS 8.8 HIGH

CVSS base score: 8.8 (High) CISA · v3.1

Score assigned by CISA's Vulnrichment program; the vendor's CVE record did not include one.

Vendor: Samba   Product: Samba

Description

The Samba vfs_fruit module uses extended file attributes (EA, xattr) to provide "...enhanced compatibility with Apple SMB clients and interoperability with a Netatalk 3 AFP fileserver." Samba versions prior to 4.13.17, 4.14.12 and 4.15.5 with vfs_fruit configured allow out-of-bounds heap read and write via specially crafted extended file attributes. A remote attacker with write access to extended file attributes can execute arbitrary code with the privileges of smbd, typically root.

Lifecycle Timeline

Each milestone comes from a different source, so gaps between them are gaps in what those sources publish, not evidence that nothing happened. EPSS history for this CVE holds 251 points from 2022-02-26, tracked daily from 2026-09-09; earlier points are weekly, which dates a spike to within a week. Peak probability 80.1% on 2023-03-11.

Published Applicability

Red Hat CSAF/VEX 0 affected · 1694 fixed · 71 not affected
OSV.dev (incl. GHSA) 3 affected · 3 fixed · 0 not affected
CVE List v5 (CNA container) 3 affected · 0 fixed · 0 not affected

Check whether a specific version is affected →

What each source publishes about which product versions carry this vulnerability, kept as written rather than merged. Absence here means no source has published applicability data, not that nothing is affected.

Research & News Coverage

No mentions found in monitored research blogs or news feeds.

Detection & Exploitation

Exploit / Pen Test
Network IDS/IPS
none published
Host / SIEM
none published

Coverage across public collections only: Nuclei and OpenVAS NVT (scan); Snort and Suricata ET Open (network); Sigma and YARA (host/SIEM); Metasploit, Exploit-DB and public GitHub repositories (exploit). Absence here means nothing public was found, not that detection is impossible.
GitHub PoC repositories are collected automatically by PoC-in-GitHub (CC0) and are not vetted: some are fakes and some are malware. Treat them as evidence that code was published, not as code to run.
OpenVAS coverage derives from the Greenbone Community Feed, made available under the Open Database License (ODbL) v1.0; its individual Vulnerability Tests are licensed GNU GPL v2.

Distribution Status

Debian · samba bookworm 2:4.16.0+dfsg-2 trixie 2:4.16.0+dfsg-2 forky 2:4.16.0+dfsg-2 sid 2:4.16.0+dfsg-2 scope: local

Where the distribution has shipped a fix, and in which version. Green means the release has resolved it, amber that it is still open. Data from the Debian Security Tracker, used under Debian's MIT / GPLv2+ terms. Debian is upstream of several other distributions, so a fix here often precedes theirs.

CISA Assessment (Vulnrichment / SSVC)

none
no
total
8.8 HIGH
—
CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:H
CWE-125 — Out-of-bounds Read
2025-04-23

D3FEND Countermeasures

Defensive techniques inferred by MITRE D3FEND from the underlying weakness (CWE-125) — general hardening and detection guidance for this weakness class, not a vendor patch for this specific CVE.

Listed By

SourceDateRecord
CISA Vulnrichment 2025-04-23 source record →

Referenced in Advisories

DateAdvisoryIssuer
2024-07-25 North Korea Cyber Group Conducts Global Espionage Campaign to Advance Regime’s Military and Nuclear Programs NSA
2024-07-25 North Korea Cyber Group Conducts Global Espionage Campaign to Advance Regime's Military and Nuclear Programs NSA

Weaponization Timeline — Offensive & Testing Tools

No exploit-tool sightings recorded for this CVE.

Evidence tiers are explained on the About page — a merged Metasploit module is far stronger evidence than a distro package mention.

External References