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CVE-2024-20481

Medium CVSS 5.8 Known exploited

Published 2024-10-23 · last changed 2026-08-11 · added to CISA KEV 2024-10-24

This one is being exploited in the wild.

CISA added CVE-2024-20481 to the Known Exploited Vulnerabilities catalog on 2024-10-24. Federal agencies are required to remediate it on a deadline. If you have affected machines, this is the class of finding that moves ahead of the rest of the queue.

The fix

We hold no Microsoft remediation data for CVE-2024-20481, which normally means it is not a Windows CVE. For non-Microsoft software the fix is the vendor's own updated release, and the affected versions are listed below.

What it is

A vulnerability in the Remote Access VPN (RAVPN) service of Cisco Adaptive Security Appliance (ASA) Software and Cisco Firepower Threat Defense (FTD) Software could allow an unauthenticated, remote attacker to cause a denial of service (DoS) of the RAVPN service. This vulnerability is due to resource exhaustion. An attacker could exploit this vulnerability by sending a large number of VPN authentication requests to an affected device. A successful exploit could allow the attacker to exhaust resources, resulting in a DoS of the RAVPN service on the affected device. Depending on the impact of the attack, a reload of the device may be required to restore the RAVPN service. Services that are not related to VPN are not affected. Cisco Talos discussed these attacks in the blog post Large-scale brute-force activity targeting VPNs, SSH services with commonly used login credentials.

Sources

CVSS vector: CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:C/C:N/I:N/A:L