What is CVE-2021-0188?

CVE-2021-0188 is a high-severity vulnerability in Intel Xeon E3-1220 V5, classified under Improper Restriction of Operations within the Bounds of a Memory Buffer. CVSS score: 7.8/10. Published 2022-05-12.

How severe is CVE-2021-0188?

High severity. CVSS v3 base score is 7.8 out of 10.

Buffer overflow in Intel Xeon E3-1220 V5

CVE-2021-0188

Return of pointer value outside of expected range in the BIOS firmware for some Intel(R) Processors may allow a privileged user to potentially enable aescalation of privilege via local access.

Vulnerability class: Buffer Overflow

Published 2022-05-12 · last modified 2026-06-17.

CVSS v3 metric

CVSS v3 base score 7.8 (High). Vector: CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:H.

EPSS exploit prediction

EPSS: 0.003 (18.5th percentile), scored 2026-10-06.

Very low probability of exploitation in the next 30 days; routine patching cadence is appropriate. 19th percentile — 18.5% of CVEs in the catalogue have a lower EPSS than this one. How to read EPSS.

EPSS over last 30 days · oldest: 0.003 · newest: 0.003 · change: +0.000

Affected products

Weakness classification (CWE)

CWE-119 — Improper Restriction of Operations within the Bounds of a Memory Buffer

References

www.intel.com/content/www/us/en/security-center/advisory/intel-sa-00601.html (Vendor Advisory)
security.netapp.com/advisory/ntap-20220818-0003/ (Third Party Advisory)

Frequently asked questions

What is CVE-2021-0188?: CVE-2021-0188 is a high-severity vulnerability in Intel Xeon E3-1220 V5, classified under Improper Restriction of Operations within the Bounds of a Memory Buffer. CVSS score: 7.8/10. Published 2022-05-12.
How severe is CVE-2021-0188?: High severity. CVSS v3 base score is 7.8 out of 10.