Cisco Policy Suite Static SSH Keys Vulnerability

published 2021-11-04 5 y ago modified 2026-06-17 4 mo ago also EUVD-2021-27306

cvss: 9.8; version 3.1, CNA
cisa kev: Not listed; not in CISA's catalog
epss: 2.5%; EPSS 2.5% chance of exploitation in 30 days, percentile 84%
public exploits: 0; none known

A vulnerability in the key-based SSH authentication mechanism of Cisco Policy Suite could allow an unauthenticated, remote attacker to log in to an affected system as the root user. This vulnerability is due to the re-use of static SSH keys across installations. An attacker could exploit this vulnerability by extracting a key from a system under their control. A successful exploit could allow the attacker to log in to an affected system as the root user.

Patch / fix

fixed in 1

cisco policy_suite 21.1.0

CISA SSVC

Exploitation: none
Automatable: yes
Technical impact: total
Assessed: 2 y ago (2024-11-07)

Exploit prediction

2.50% chance of exploitation in the next 30 days, higher than 84% of all scored CVEs (FIRST EPSS, 2026-11-08).

CVSS scores

assigned by	version	score	vector
CNA	3.1	9.8	CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:H
NVD	3.1	9.8	CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:H
NVD	2.0	10.0	AV:N/AC:L/Au:N/C:C/I:C/A:C

Affected products

Cisco Cisco Policy Suite (CPS) Software

Classification

Weakness

CWE-321 Use of Hard-coded Cryptographic Key
CWE-798 Use of Hard-coded Credentials

References

tools.cisco.com /security/center/content/CiscoSecurityAdvisory/cisco-sa-cps-static-key-JmS92hNv
vendor-advisory

Sources

CVE List CVE-2021-40119
NVD CVE-2021-40119

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Summary