CVE-2021-29530

critical
Published 2021-05-21 · Modified 2023-12-06
CVSS v3
CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:H/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:L
CVSS v2
VIR risk
9.5

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.

Predictions

Exploit likelihood
20%
Patch ETA

Heuristic predictions, AS-IS, for prioritization only.

Mitigations

vendor Authored 2026-05-27

Vendor advisory: debian — https://security-tracker.debian.org/tracker/CVE-2021-29530

OS impact

OSVersionStatusFixed in
arch archfixed2.5.0-1
debian debianforkyfixed0
debian debiansidfixed0

Package impact

EcosystemPackageVulnerableFixed
python PyPItensorflow<2.1.42.1.4
python PyPItensorflow>=2.2.0,<2.2.32.2.3
python PyPItensorflow>=2.3.0,<2.3.32.3.3
python PyPItensorflow>=2.4.0,<2.4.22.4.2
python PyPItensorflow-cpu<2.1.42.1.4
python PyPItensorflow-cpu>=2.2.0,<2.2.32.2.3
python PyPItensorflow-cpu>=2.3.0,<2.3.32.3.3
python PyPItensorflow-cpu>=2.4.0,<2.4.22.4.2
python PyPItensorflow-gpu<2.1.42.1.4
python PyPItensorflow-gpu>=2.2.0,<2.2.32.2.3
python PyPItensorflow-gpu>=2.3.0,<2.3.32.3.3
python PyPItensorflow-gpu>=2.4.0,<2.4.22.4.2
python PyPItensorflow<e6a7c7cc18c3aaad1ae0872cb0a959f5c923d2bd||>=2.4.0,<2.4.2e6a7c7cc18c3aaad1ae0872cb0a959f5c923d2bd
python PyPItensorflow-cpu<e6a7c7cc18c3aaad1ae0872cb0a959f5c923d2bd||>=2.4.0,<2.4.2e6a7c7cc18c3aaad1ae0872cb0a959f5c923d2bd
python PyPItensorflow-gpu<e6a7c7cc18c3aaad1ae0872cb0a959f5c923d2bd||>=2.4.0,<2.4.2e6a7c7cc18c3aaad1ae0872cb0a959f5c923d2bd

References

Verify integrity in audit chain (admin only). AS-IS.