Description

In the Wi-Fi NPU FW, there is a possible out-of-bounds write due to an incorrect bounds check. This could lead to local denial of service with user execution privileges needed. User interaction is not needed for exploitation.

Executive Summary

Technical Details

Mitigations

References

Additional Metadata

{
  "score": "6.3",
  "pubDate": "2026-11-06T04:16:35.437Z",
  "pubdate": "2026-11-06T04:16:35.437Z",
  "executiveSummary": "A critical out-of-bounds (OOB) write vulnerability has been identified within the firmware of the Wi-Fi Network Processing Unit (NPU).\nThe vulnerability originates from an inadequate bounds check during memory operations, which allows an attacker to perform unauthorized write operations into sensitive memory regions.\nThe primary impact of this flaw is a local denial of service (DoS), potentially resulting in system instability or a complete crash of the NPU firmware.\nExploitation of this vulnerability requires the attacker to possess user execution privileges on the target system; however, the attack does not necessitate any user interaction, facilitating automated or script-based exploitation once initial access is obtained.\nThe risk is categorized as significant, as it enables localized resource exhaustion or service disruption within the wireless subsystem, potentially impacting overall device availability.\nThe vulnerability is limited to local exploitation, requiring an existing execution context, which restricts the threat profile to actors who have already breached the initial perimeter.",
  "technicalDetails": "The root cause of this vulnerability is a logic error in the firmware’s memory management routines, specifically pertaining to the validation of input buffers before writing to destination memory locations in the NPU’s address space.\nDuring standard operation, the NPU processes packets or control signals through a dedicated buffer. The firmware fails to verify that the offset or length of the incoming data conforms to the allocated capacity of the destination buffer.\nWhen an attacker provides a crafted payload designed to exceed these boundaries, the firmware performs an out-of-bounds write. Because the bounds checking mechanism is flawed, the boundary condition is bypassed, allowing the write operation to proceed into memory adjacent to the intended buffer.\nThe attack flow proceeds as follows: First, the attacker leverages existing user execution privileges to interface with the Wi-Fi NPU driver or API. Second, the attacker submits a specifically structured malicious packet or command that triggers the vulnerable code path.\nThe firmware attempts to write the payload to the internal memory; due to the lack of sufficient validation, the pointer calculation exceeds the allocated buffer size. This results in the overwriting of critical firmware data, function pointers, or control structures.\nPost-exploitation, the immediate result is typically a memory corruption event. Given the nature of NPU firmware, which handles time-sensitive and hardware-critical tasks, the memory corruption invariably leads to a kernel panic, firmware exception, or an infinite loop, effectively causing a local denial of service.\nWhile the vulnerability is primarily characterized as a denial of service, improper sanitization of user-controlled inputs in memory-resident firmware poses broader risks, including potential stability degradation of the host system's wireless stack. The NPU acts as a high-performance intermediary, and its failure can force the host system to drop network connections or reset the entire WLAN interface to recover from the faulted state. There is no requirement for remote access or complex network-level exploitation vectors; the vulnerability resides entirely within the local firmware execution environment."
}