CVE-2021-29530

LOW

TensorFlow < 2.1.4 - Null Pointer Dereference via SparseMatrixSparseCholesky

Title source: llm
STIX 2.1

Description

TensorFlow is an end-to-end open source platform for machine learning. An attacker can trigger a null pointer dereference by providing an invalid `permutation` to `tf.raw_ops.SparseMatrixSparseCholesky`. This is because the implementation(https://github.com/tensorflow/tensorflow/blob/080f1d9e257589f78b3ffb75debf584168aa6062/tensorflow/core/kernels/sparse/sparse_cholesky_op.cc#L85-L86) fails to properly validate the input arguments. Although `ValidateInputs` is called and there are checks in the body of this function, the code proceeds to the next line in `ValidateInputs` since `OP_REQUIRES`(https://github.com/tensorflow/tensorflow/blob/080f1d9e257589f78b3ffb75debf584168aa6062/tensorflow/core/framework/op_requires.h#L41-L48) is a macro that only exits the current function. Thus, the first validation condition that fails in `ValidateInputs` will cause an early return from that function. However, the caller will continue execution from the next line. The fix is to either explicitly check `context->status()` or to convert `ValidateInputs` to return a `Status`. The fix will be included in TensorFlow 2.5.0. We will also cherrypick this commit on TensorFlow 2.4.2, TensorFlow 2.3.3, TensorFlow 2.2.3 and TensorFlow 2.1.4, as these are also affected and still in supported range.

References (2)

Core 2
Core References
Exploit, Patch, Third Party Advisory x_refsource_confirm
https://github.com/tensorflow/tensorflow/security/advisories/GHSA-xcwj-wfcm-m23c

Scores

CVSS v3 2.5
EPSS 0.0023
EPSS Percentile 14.0%
Attack Vector LOCAL
CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:H/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:L

Details

CWE
CWE-476
Status published
Products (4)
google/tensorflow < 2.1.4
pypi/tensorflow 0 - 2.1.4PyPI
pypi/tensorflow-cpu 0 - 2.1.4PyPI
pypi/tensorflow-gpu 0 - 2.1.4PyPI
Published May 14, 2021
Tracked Since Feb 18, 2026