CVE-2021-20257

MEDIUMNVD 6.56.5—
EchelonGraph scoreMEDIUM confidence

Score 6.5 from GitHub Security Advisory published 2022-03-17. NVD baseline CVSS 6.5; sources differ by 0.0.

Triggered by: GitHub Security Advisory CVSS
Sources: epss, ghsa, nvd
6.5EG
EchelonGraph verdictMonitorLow exploitation likelihood right now — keep watching.
  • Lower severity and no public exploit yet
CISA-KEV: Not listedEPSS PROB: 0%CVSS: 6.5Exploit: None knownExposed: 0

A fix is available — apply it.

An infinite loop flaw was found in the e1000 NIC emulator of the QEMU. This issue occurs while processing transmits (tx) descriptors in process_tx_desc if various descriptor fields are initialized with invalid values. This flaw allows a guest to consume CPU cycles on the host, resulting in a denial of service. The highest threat from this vulnerability is to system availability.

CVSS v3
6.5
EG Score
6.5(medium)
EG Risk
34(Track)
EG Risk 34/100SSVC: Track

EG Risk is EchelonGraph's 0–100 priority score: it fuses intrinsic severity with real-world exploitation and automatability so you can rank equal-severity CVEs and fix the most dangerous first. Higher = act sooner. Distinct from the 0–10 EG Score (severity).

How it’s computed
Severity65% × 45%
Exploitation0% × 40%
Automatability30% × 15%
Action: Routine — remediate on your standard cadence.
EPSS PROB
0%
EPSS %ILE
30%
KEV
Not listed

Published

March 16, 2022

Last Modified

November 21, 2024

References (14)

Vendor Advisories for CVE-2021-20257(2)

These vendors published their own advisory mentioning this CVE — often with vendor-specific remediation steps + affected product lists not in NVD.

Patch Availability(3)

Vendor / EcosystemFixed in / PatchReleasedSource
ubuntuqemu-system-x86-xen (1:5.2+dfsg-9ubuntu3.1) @ hirsute2026-05-26ubuntu
redhatvirt-devel:av-8050020211203164130.c53685002022-01-11redhat
redhatvirt:rhel-8050020211203195115.c53685002021-12-21redhat

Patches are aggregated from vendor advisories (Red Hat, Microsoft, Cisco, GitHub) and package ecosystems (OSV, GHSA). Multiple rows for the same upstream release have been deduplicated.

Affected Packages

(6 across 6 ecosystems)
Debian:10(1)
PackageVulnerable rangeFixed inDependents
qemu1:3.1+dfsg-8 ... 1:3.1+dfsg-8~deb10u1 (9 versions)1:3.1+dfsg-8+deb10u9—
Debian:11(1)
PackageVulnerable rangeFixed inDependents
qemu—1:5.2+dfsg-9—
Debian:12(1)
PackageVulnerable rangeFixed inDependents
qemu—1:5.2+dfsg-9—
Debian:13(1)
PackageVulnerable rangeFixed inDependents
qemu—1:5.2+dfsg-9—
Debian:14(1)
PackageVulnerable rangeFixed inDependents
qemu—1:5.2+dfsg-9—
Debian:9(1)
PackageVulnerable rangeFixed inDependents
qemu1:2.8+dfsg-6 ... 1:2.8+dfsg-6+deb9u9 (14 versions)1:2.8+dfsg-6+deb9u14—

Weakness Classification(1)

MITRE Common Weakness Enumeration — the root-cause categories this CVE belongs to.

Additional Vendor Advisories

(2)

Vendors that published advisories for this CVE beyond the curated set above. Broader coverage but minimal per-row detail — click through for the original advisory.

Data Freshness Timeline

(refreshed 9× in last 7d / 30× in last 30d)

Each row is a source pipeline that fetched or updated this CVE on that date, with what changed. For example, "NVD update" means NVD published or revised its analysis for this CVE; "MITRE cvelistV5" means we ingested or refreshed it from the CNA feed. Most recent first.

Showing the most recent 100 of 151 total refreshes for this CVE.

  1. 2026-09-07 15:58 UTCEPSS rescore
  2. 2026-09-06 13:44 UTCEPSS rescore
  3. 2026-09-06 13:44 UTCEPSS rescore
  4. 2026-09-05 18:55 UTCOSV refresh
  5. 2026-09-05 15:25 UTCEPSS rescore
  6. 2026-09-04 13:57 UTCEPSS rescore
  7. 2026-09-04 05:03 UTCEPSS rescore
  8. 2026-09-02 14:08 UTCEPSS rescore
  9. 2026-09-01 13:50 UTCEPSS rescore
  10. 2026-09-01 03:32 UTCEPSS rescore
  11. 2026-08-30 19:14 UTCEPSS rescore
  12. 2026-08-30 01:19 UTCEPSS rescore
  13. 2026-08-28 21:37 UTCEPSS rescore
  14. 2026-08-27 14:22 UTCEPSS rescore
  15. 2026-08-26 14:42 UTCEPSS rescore
  16. 2026-08-25 13:45 UTCEPSS rescore
  17. 2026-08-23 00:16 UTCEPSS rescore
  18. 2026-08-21 23:46 UTCEPSS rescore
  19. 2026-08-20 22:52 UTCEPSS rescore
  20. 2026-08-19 17:01 UTCEPSS rescore
  21. 2026-08-19 05:59 UTCOSV refresh
  22. 2026-08-18 13:45 UTCEPSS rescore
  23. 2026-08-17 13:43 UTCEPSS rescore
  24. 2026-08-16 14:52 UTCEPSS rescore
  25. 2026-08-16 02:11 UTCEPSS rescore
Show 75 more
  1. 2026-08-15 01:27 UTCEPSS rescore
  2. 2026-08-13 21:57 UTCEPSS rescore
  3. 2026-08-12 13:47 UTCEPSS rescore
  4. 2026-08-11 13:38 UTCEPSS rescore
  5. 2026-08-09 13:43 UTCEPSS rescore
  6. 2026-08-08 16:33 UTCEPSS rescore
  7. 2026-08-07 16:23 UTCEPSS rescore
  8. 2026-08-06 13:43 UTCEPSS rescore
  9. 2026-08-05 19:14 UTCEPSS rescore
  10. 2026-08-04 15:06 UTCEPSS rescore
  11. 2026-08-04 10:34 UTCEPSS rescore
  12. 2026-08-04 01:27 UTCOSV refresh
  13. 2026-08-03 10:32 UTCEPSS rescore
  14. 2026-08-02 02:24 UTCEPSS rescore
  15. 2026-08-01 04:12 UTCEPSS rescore
  16. 2026-07-30 16:25 UTCEPSS rescore
  17. 2026-07-30 01:27 UTCEPSS rescore
  18. 2026-07-30 01:27 UTCEPSS rescore
  19. 2026-07-26 14:52 UTCEPSS rescore
  20. 2026-07-25 14:15 UTCEPSS rescore
  21. 2026-07-24 14:15 UTCEPSS rescore
  22. 2026-07-23 14:15 UTCEPSS rescore
  23. 2026-07-23 01:56 UTCEG score recompute
  24. 2026-07-22 22:43 UTCEG score recompute
  25. 2026-07-22 14:05 UTCEPSS rescore
  26. 2026-07-21 15:22 UTCEPSS rescore
  27. 2026-07-21 15:22 UTCEPSS rescore
  28. 2026-07-20 17:04 UTCEPSS rescore
  29. 2026-07-19 14:28 UTCEPSS rescore
  30. 2026-07-19 02:26 UTCEPSS rescore
  31. 2026-07-18 10:02 UTCEPSS rescore
  32. 2026-07-17 20:29 UTCOSV refresh
  33. 2026-07-16 17:00 UTCEPSS rescore
  34. 2026-07-15 16:55 UTCEPSS rescore
  35. 2026-07-15 16:55 UTCEPSS rescore
  36. 2026-07-15 01:57 UTCEPSS rescore
  37. 2026-07-13 22:27 UTCEPSS rescore
  38. 2026-07-13 22:27 UTCEPSS rescore
  39. 2026-07-13 06:10 UTCEPSS rescore
  40. 2026-07-13 06:10 UTCEPSS rescore
  41. 2026-07-12 05:44 UTCEPSS rescore
  42. 2026-07-12 05:44 UTCEPSS rescore
  43. 2026-07-11 08:25 UTCEPSS rescore
  44. 2026-07-09 19:07 UTCEPSS rescore
  45. 2026-07-08 15:12 UTCEPSS rescore
  46. 2026-07-07 13:43 UTCEPSS rescore
  47. 2026-07-06 16:25 UTCEPSS rescore
  48. 2026-07-06 02:21 UTCEPSS rescore
  49. 2026-07-06 02:21 UTCEPSS rescore
  50. 2026-07-05 02:28 UTCEPSS rescore
  51. 2026-07-05 02:28 UTCEPSS rescore
  52. 2026-07-04 06:29 UTCEPSS rescore
  53. 2026-07-04 06:29 UTCEPSS rescore
  54. 2026-07-02 16:57 UTCEPSS rescore
  55. 2026-07-01 15:03 UTCEPSS rescore
  56. 2026-06-30 23:20 UTCEPSS rescore
  57. 2026-06-30 23:20 UTCEPSS rescore
  58. 2026-06-29 18:23 UTCOSV refresh
  59. 2026-06-29 14:04 UTCEPSS rescore
  60. 2026-06-29 14:04 UTCEPSS rescore
  61. 2026-06-28 14:05 UTCEPSS rescore
  62. 2026-06-28 04:54 UTCEPSS rescore
  63. 2026-06-28 04:54 UTCEPSS rescore
  64. 2026-06-27 03:06 UTCEPSS rescore
  65. 2026-06-27 03:06 UTCEPSS rescore
  66. 2026-06-25 13:48 UTCEPSS rescore
  67. 2026-06-25 13:48 UTCEPSS rescore
  68. 2026-06-24 14:03 UTCEPSS rescore
  69. 2026-06-24 14:03 UTCEPSS rescore
  70. 2026-06-23 21:31 UTCEPSS rescore
  71. 2026-06-23 21:31 UTCEPSS rescore
  72. 2026-06-22 14:24 UTCEPSS rescore
  73. 2026-06-22 14:23 UTCEPSS rescore
  74. 2026-06-21 14:54 UTCEPSS rescore
  75. 2026-06-21 14:54 UTCEPSS rescore

Frequently asked(5)

What is CVE-2021-20257?
CVE-2021-20257 is a medium vulnerability published on March 16, 2022. An infinite loop flaw was found in the e1000 NIC emulator of the QEMU. This issue occurs while processing transmits (tx) descriptors in processtxdesc if various descriptor fields are initialized with invalid values. This flaw allows a guest to consume CPU cycles on the host, resulting in a denial…
When was CVE-2021-20257 disclosed?
CVE-2021-20257 was first published in the National Vulnerability Database on March 16, 2022, with the most recent update on November 21, 2024. EchelonGraph re-ingests CVE updates from NVD on a 2-hour cycle, so this page reflects the latest published state.
Is CVE-2021-20257 actively exploited?
CVE-2021-20257 is not currently on CISA's Known Exploited Vulnerabilities catalog. FIRST EPSS estimates a 0% probability of exploitation in the next 30 days, which ranks it in the top 69.9% of all scored CVEs.
What is the CVSS score of CVE-2021-20257?
CVE-2021-20257 has a CVSS v3 base score of 6.5 (NVD).
How do I remediate CVE-2021-20257?
Patch to the fixed version published by the affected vendor. Where vendor advisories exist for CVE-2021-20257, EchelonGraph cross-links them in the Vendor Advisories panel below — those typically contain the canonical remediation steps, fixed version numbers, and any vendor-specific mitigations.

Dependency Blast Radius

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