Apache Log4j2 versions 2.0-alpha1 through 2.16.0 (excluding 2.12.3 and 2.3.1) did not protect from uncontrolled recursion from self-referential lookups. This allows an attacker with control over Thread Context Map data to cause a denial of service when a crafted string is interpreted. This issue was fixed in Log4j 2.17.0, 2.12.3, and 2.3.1.
CVE-2021-45105
Score elevated to 9.0 because EPSS predicts 100% probability of exploitation within the next 30 days (99th percentile of EPSS-scored CVEs). NVD baseline CVSS 5.9 retained for reference. Confidence: see factors.
- High exploitation likelihood — EPSS 100%
A fix is available — apply it.
- CVSS v3
- 5.9
- EG Score
- 9.0CRITICALmedium confidence
- EG Risk
- 80EG Risk 80/100CISA SSVC
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 computedSeverity90% × 45%Exploitation100% × 40%Automatability0% × 15%CISA SSVC: Track at every mission impact level.Action: A fix is available. Apply it within your standard update timelines. - EPSS PROB
- 100%
- EPSS %ILE
- 99th
- KEV
- Not listed
CISA SSVCTrack at every mission impact level.
A fix is available. Apply it within your standard update timelines.
Exploitation none (CISA Vulnrichment) · Automatable no (CISA Vulnrichment) · Technical impact partial (CISA Vulnrichment). Mission impact is CISA's Mission & Well-being decision point, and only you can judge it: high means the affected system is essential to your organisation's mission, or its compromise could cause irreversible harm to people. CISA's decision table
Published
December 18, 2021
Last Modified
August 25, 2026
Advisory Details (9)
Auto-updated Aug 25, 2026[SECURITY] [DSA 5024-1] apache-log4j2 security update
https://www.debian.org/security/2021/dsa-5024Vulnerabilities in Apache Log4j Library Affecting Cisco Products: December 2021
https://tools.cisco.com/security/center/content/CiscoSecurityAdvisory/cisco-sa-apache-log4j-qRuKNEbdSecurity :: Apache Logging Services
https://logging.apache.org/log4j/2.x/security.htmloss-security - CVE-2021-45105: Apache Log4j2 does not always protect from infinite recursion in lookup evaluation
http://www.openwall.com/lists/oss-security/2021/12/19/1Vendor Advisories for CVE-2021-45105(19)
These vendors published their own advisory mentioning this CVE — often with vendor-specific remediation steps + affected product lists not in NVD.
- RHSA-2022:1463Red Hat Product SecurityLow
Red Hat Security Advisory: Red Hat Single Sign-On 7.5.2 security update on RHEL 8
- RHSA-2022:1462Red Hat Product SecurityLow
Red Hat Security Advisory: Red Hat Single Sign-On 7.5.2 security update on RHEL 7
- RHSA-2022:1469Red Hat Product SecurityLow
Red Hat Security Advisory: Red Hat Single Sign-On 7.5.2 security update
- RHSA-2022:1299Red Hat Product SecurityLow
Red Hat Security Advisory: Red Hat JBoss Enterprise Application Platform 7.4.4 security update
- RHSA-2022:1297Red Hat Product SecurityLow
Red Hat Security Advisory: Red Hat JBoss Enterprise Application Platform 7.4.4 security update
- RHSA-2022:1296Red Hat Product SecurityLow
Red Hat Security Advisory: Red Hat JBoss Enterprise Application Platform 7.4.4 security update
- RHSA-2022:0223Red Hat Product SecurityMedium
Red Hat Security Advisory: Red Hat Integration Camel-K 1.6.3 release and security update
- RHSA-2022:0222Red Hat Product SecurityMedium
Red Hat Security Advisory: Red Hat Integration Camel Extensions for Quarkus 2.2 security update
- +11 more
Patch Availability(16)
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
(8 across 7 ecosystems)
Maven(2)
| Package | Vulnerable range | Fix by version range | Dependents |
|---|---|---|---|
| org.apache.logging.log4j:log4j-core | 2.0 ... 2.3 (19 versions) |
| — |
| org.ops4j.pax.logging:pax-logging-log4j2 | 2.0.0 ... 2.0.9 (13 versions) |
| — |
Debian:10(1)
| Package | Vulnerable range | Fix by version range | Dependents |
|---|---|---|---|
| apache-log4j2 | 2.11.1-2 ... 2.16.0-1~deb11u1 (9 versions) |
| — |
Debian:11(1)
| Package | Vulnerable range | Fix by version range | Dependents |
|---|---|---|---|
| apache-log4j2 | 2.13.3-1 ... 2.17.0-1~deb10u1 (8 versions) |
| — |
Debian:12(1)
| Package | Vulnerable range | Fix by version range | Dependents |
|---|---|---|---|
| apache-log4j2 | — |
| — |
Debian:13(1)
| Package | Vulnerable range | Fix by version range | Dependents |
|---|---|---|---|
| apache-log4j2 | — |
| — |
Debian:14(1)
| Package | Vulnerable range | Fix by version range | Dependents |
|---|---|---|---|
| apache-log4j2 | — |
| — |
Debian:9(1)
| Package | Vulnerable range | Fix by version range | Dependents |
|---|---|---|---|
| apache-log4j2 | 2.10.0-1 ... 2.8.2-2 (9 versions) |
| — |
Weakness Classification(2)
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 0× in last 7d / 3× 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.
- 2026-10-02 17:40 UTCOSV refresh
- 2026-09-30 15:44 UTCEG score recompute
- 2026-09-13 14:54 UTCOSV refresh
- 2026-08-25 16:34 UTCEG score recompute
- 2026-08-25 16:34 UTCVendor advisory
- 2026-08-24 07:57 UTCOSV refresh
- 2026-08-16 02:11 UTCEPSS rescore
- 2026-08-08 04:19 UTCOSV refresh
- 2026-07-23 02:05 UTCEG score recompute
- 2026-07-22 21:21 UTCEG score recompute▲ 3.10
- 2026-07-22 21:21 UTCVendor advisory
- 2026-07-18 05:29 UTCOSV refresh
- 2026-06-30 02:00 UTCOSV refresh
- 2026-06-15 17:46 UTCEPSS rescore
- 2026-06-13 22:58 UTCEPSS rescore
- 2026-06-13 22:58 UTCEPSS rescore
- 2026-06-12 23:10 UTCEPSS rescore
- 2026-06-12 14:40 UTCOSV refresh
- 2026-06-11 13:58 UTCEPSS rescore
- 2026-06-11 13:58 UTCEPSS rescore
- 2026-06-10 22:16 UTCEPSS rescore
- 2026-06-10 22:16 UTCEPSS rescore
- 2026-06-10 13:20 UTCEPSS rescore
- 2026-06-08 14:15 UTCEPSS rescore
- 2026-06-08 14:15 UTCEPSS rescore
Show 20 moreShow fewer
- 2026-06-07 15:23 UTCEPSS rescore
- 2026-06-07 15:23 UTCEPSS rescore
- 2026-06-05 22:45 UTCEPSS rescore
- 2026-06-05 06:09 UTCEPSS rescore
- 2026-06-05 06:09 UTCEPSS rescore
- 2026-06-04 13:10 UTCEPSS rescore
- 2026-06-04 13:10 UTCEPSS rescore
- 2026-06-02 20:11 UTCEPSS rescore
- 2026-06-02 20:11 UTCEPSS rescore
- 2026-06-01 13:50 UTCEPSS rescore
- 2026-06-01 13:50 UTCEPSS rescore
- 2026-05-31 00:15 UTCEPSS rescore
- 2026-05-31 00:15 UTCEPSS rescore
- 2026-05-29 13:42 UTCEPSS rescore
- 2026-05-28 13:43 UTCEPSS rescore
- 2026-05-28 13:43 UTCEPSS rescore
- 2026-05-27 13:39 UTCEPSS rescore
- 2026-05-27 13:39 UTCEPSS rescore
- 2026-05-26 06:06 UTCEG score recompute
- 2026-05-26 06:06 UTCVendor advisory
Publicly available exploits
(2 references)Working exploit code is in the public domain (2 GitHub PoCs). Defenders should treat patch urgency accordingly — public PoCs typically lead to mass-exploitation within 24-72 hours.
- GitHub PoCiAmSOScArEd/log4j2_dos_exploitFirst seen Dec 20, 2021
log4j2 dos exploit,CVE-2021-45105 exploit,Denial of Service poc
Open source ↗ - GitHub PoCcckuailong/Log4j_dos_CVE-2021-45105First seen Dec 18, 2021
Log4j_dos_CVE-2021-45105
Open source ↗
Past incidents using this CVE
(1)This CVE was central to one or more publicly-documented breaches. Each card links to authoritative reporting at the time of the incident.
- Log4Shell (Apache Log4j)Dec 2021
JNDI lookup injection in Log4j, a ubiquitous Java logging library. Pre-auth unauthenticated RCE; Apache Foundation called it the worst vulnerability in a decade. Active exploitation continues 3+ years later.
Source: Wired
Related CVEs(same product + same vendor + same CWE)
Same product
10 shownDebian:10:apache-log4j2 · Debian:9:apache-log4j2 · Debian:11:apache-log4j2
- CVE-2021-44228EG 10.0 KEVEPSS p100CRITICAL
- CVE-2021-45046EG 9.0 KEVEPSS p100CRITICAL
- CVE-2021-44832NVD 6.6EG 9.0EPSS p100CRITICAL
- CVE-2020-9488EG 3.7EPSS p95LOW
- CVE-2017-5645EG 9.8EPSS p100CRITICAL
- CVE-2026-34480EG 7.5HIGH
- CVE-2025-68161EG 4.8MEDIUM
- CVE-2026-34481EG 7.5HIGH
- CVE-2026-34479EG 7.5HIGH
- CVE-2026-49844EG 5.9MEDIUM
Same vendor
8 shownredhat:RHSA-2022:0083 · redhat:RHSA-2022:1296 · redhat:RHSA-2022:0203
- CVE-2021-44832NVD 6.6EG 9.0EPSS p100CRITICAL
- CVE-2021-45046EG 9.0 KEVEPSS p100CRITICAL
- CVE-2022-23307NVD 8.8EG 9.8EPSS p99CRITICAL
- CVE-2022-23305EG 9.8EPSS p99CRITICAL
- CVE-2022-23302EG 8.9EPSS p99HIGH
- CVE-2021-4104NVD 7.5EG 8.9EPSS p100HIGH
- CVE-2021-44228EG 10.0 KEVEPSS p100CRITICAL
- CVE-2021-38153EG 5.9EPSS p93MEDIUM
Same CWE
10 shownCWE-20
- CVE-2021-43242EG 7.6HIGH
- CVE-2021-44422EG 7.8HIGH
- CVE-2021-45419EG 8.8HIGH
- CVE-2021-45462EG 7.5EPSS p91HIGH
- CVE-2021-44548EG 9.8EPSS p92CRITICAL
- CVE-2021-44228EG 10.0 KEVEPSS p100CRITICAL
- CVE-2021-43803NVD 7.5EG 7.9EPSS p99HIGH
- CVE-2021-45687EG 9.8CRITICAL
- CVE-2021-45711EG 7.5HIGH
- CVE-2021-43802EG 9.9CRITICAL
Frequently asked(5)
What is CVE-2021-45105?
When was CVE-2021-45105 disclosed?
Is CVE-2021-45105 actively exploited?
What is the CVSS score of CVE-2021-45105?
How do I remediate CVE-2021-45105?
Dependency Blast Radius
See which npm, PyPI, Go, and Maven packages are affected by CVE-2021-45105
Is Your Infrastructure Affected by CVE-2021-45105?
EchelonGraph automatically scans your cloud infrastructure and maps CVE exposure using blast radius analysis.