CVE-2021-29543

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 denial of service via a `CHECK`-fail in `tf.raw_ops.CTCGreedyDecoder`. This is because the implementation(https://github.com/tensorflow/tensorflow/blob/1615440b17b364b875eb06f43d087381f1460a65/tensorflow/core/kernels/ctc_decoder_ops.cc#L37-L50) has a `CHECK_LT` inserted to validate some invariants. When this condition is false, the program aborts, instead of returning a valid error to the user. This abnormal termination can be weaponized in denial of service attacks. 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-2021-29543

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<ea3b43e98c32c97b35d52b4c66f9107452ca8fb2||>=2.4.0,<2.4.3ea3b43e98c32c97b35d52b4c66f9107452ca8fb2
python PyPItensorflow-cpu<ea3b43e98c32c97b35d52b4c66f9107452ca8fb2||>=2.4.0,<2.4.3ea3b43e98c32c97b35d52b4c66f9107452ca8fb2
python PyPItensorflow-gpu<ea3b43e98c32c97b35d52b4c66f9107452ca8fb2||>=2.4.0,<2.4.3ea3b43e98c32c97b35d52b4c66f9107452ca8fb2

References

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