Description

IBM AIX 7.2, and 7.3 and IBM PowerVM VIOS 4.1 could allow a remote authenticated attacker to obtain sensitive information or cause a denial of service due to an out-of-bounds read.

Executive Summary

Technical Details

Mitigations

References

Additional Metadata

{
  "score": "7.9",
  "pubDate": "2026-08-20T22:17:16.600Z",
  "pubdate": "2026-08-20T22:17:16.600Z",
  "executiveSummary": "This vulnerability is an out-of-bounds read security flaw affecting specific IBM operating systems and virtualization products. The vulnerability impacts IBM AIX 7.2, IBM AIX 7.3, and IBM PowerVM VIOS 4.1.\nSuccessful exploitation of this vulnerability allows a remote authenticated attacker to compromise system availability and confidentiality. The primary impacts include the potential to cause a denial of service condition against affected services and the capability to obtain sensitive information from memory.\nThe risk implications are moderate to high depending on the deployment context, as unauthorized disclosure of sensitive data can lead to further compromise, while denial of service disrupts critical virtualization and operating system workloads.\nAttacker capabilities require authenticated access to the target environment. The exploitation process relies on interacting with vulnerable components that fail to adequately validate bounds during memory read operations, leading to memory exposure or application crashes.",
  "technicalDetails": "The root cause of the vulnerability stems from an out-of-bounds read flaw within memory handling routines of the affected operating systems and virtualization infrastructure. Specifically, the vulnerable component fails to perform rigorous boundary checks when processing inputs or reading data structures, allowing read operations to access memory addresses outside of the allocated buffer boundaries.\nExploitation requires the attacker to be authenticated, indicating that the threat actor must possess valid credentials or session access within the security boundary of the target system. Network exposure facilitates remote interaction with the vulnerable service or daemon responsible for processing the malformed requests or inputs.\nThe attack flow proceeds as follows: First, the authenticated attacker establishes a network connection to the targeted service running on IBM AIX 7.2, 7.3, or IBM PowerVM VIOS 4.1. Second, the attacker transmits a specially crafted request or payload designed to trigger the out-of-bounds memory read condition within the vulnerable parsing or handling function.\nUpon receiving the input, the vulnerable component executes a read operation past the designated buffer boundary. If the out-of-bounds memory address points to unmapped or protected memory regions, the process crashes, resulting in a denial of service. Alternatively, if the out-of-bounds read accesses allocated memory containing sensitive data, the memory contents may be inadvertently exposed to the attacker in subsequent responses or application logs.\nPost-exploitation impact includes the extraction of confidential data residing in adjacent memory segments, which may contain cryptographic material, internal system states, or user credentials. Furthermore, repeated triggering of the out-of-bounds read can sustain a denial of service condition, impacting system reliability and operational continuity."
}