CVE-2021-29609

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:L/A:H
CVSS v2
VIR risk
9.5

Description

TensorFlow is an end-to-end open source platform for machine learning. Incomplete validation in `SparseAdd` results in allowing attackers to exploit undefined behavior (dereferencing null pointers) as well as write outside of bounds of heap allocated data. The implementation(https://github.com/tensorflow/tensorflow/blob/656e7673b14acd7835dc778867f84916c6d1cac2/tensorflow/core/kernels/sparse_add_op.cc) has a large set of validation for the two sparse tensor inputs (6 tensors in total), but does not validate that the tensors are not empty or that the second dimension of `*_indices` matches the size of corresponding `*_shape`. This allows attackers to send tensor triples that represent invalid sparse tensors to abuse code assumptions that are not protected by validation. 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-2021-29609

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<6fd02f44810754ae7481838b6a67c5df7f909ca3||>=2.4.0,<2.4.241727ff06111117bdf86b37db198217fd7a143cc
python PyPItensorflow-cpu<6fd02f44810754ae7481838b6a67c5df7f909ca3||>=2.4.0,<2.4.241727ff06111117bdf86b37db198217fd7a143cc
python PyPItensorflow-gpu<6fd02f44810754ae7481838b6a67c5df7f909ca3||>=2.4.0,<2.4.241727ff06111117bdf86b37db198217fd7a143cc

References

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