CVE-2025-20115

A vulnerability in confederation implementation for the Border Gateway Protocol (BGP) in Cisco IOS XR Software could allow an unauthenticated, remote attacker to cause a denial of service (DoS) condition. This vulnerability is due to a memory corruption that occurs when a BGP update is created with an AS_CONFED_SEQUENCE attribute that has 255 autonomous system numbers (AS numbers). An attacker could exploit this vulnerability by sending a crafted BGP update message, or the network could be designed in such a manner that the AS_CONFED_SEQUENCE attribute grows to 255 AS numbers or more. A successful exploit could allow the attacker to cause memory corruption, which may cause the BGP process to restart, resulting in a DoS condition. To exploit this vulnerability, an attacker must control a BGP confederation speaker within the same autonomous system as the victim, or the network must be designed in such a manner that the AS_CONFED_SEQUENCE attribute grows to 255 AS numbers or more.

• CWE-120

• https://blog.apnic.net/2024/09/02/crafting-endless-as-paths-in-bgp/Third Party Advisory
• https://sec.cloudapps.cisco.com/security/center/content/CiscoSecurityAdvisory/cisco-sa-iosxr-bgp-dos-O7stePhXVendor Advisory

Published

Mar 12, 2025

Last Modified

Jun 17, 2026

Status

Analyzed