Secure Boot Bypass in Cisco IOS XE Software
CVE-2025-20314 is a secure boot bypass vulnerability in Cisco IOS XE Software caused by improper validation of software packages. According to the provided content, an authenticated local attacker with level-15 privileges, or an unauthenticated attacker with physical access to an affected device, can exploit the flaw by placing a crafted file in a specific location on the device. Successful exploitation allows persistent code to execute at boot time on the underlying operating system and breaks the device’s chain of trust.
Are you exposed to this one?
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Impact, mitigation & remediation
What it means. What to do now. Patch path, mitigations, and the assume-compromise checklist.
Impact
What an attacker gets, and what they’ve been doing with it.
Mitigation
If you can’t patch tonight, do this now.
Remediation
Patch, then assume compromise.
Exploits
No public exploits tracked yet. Mallory keeps watching.
No public exploit code observed for this vulnerability.
Affected products & vendors
Products and vendors Mallory has correlated with this vulnerability. Open in Mallory to drill down to specific CPE configurations and version ranges.
Vendor-confirmed product mapping. Mallory continuously reconciles this list against your asset inventory.
Recent activity
3 sources tracked across advisories, community write-ups, and news. New activity surfaces here as Mallory finds it.
A secure boot bypass vulnerability in Cisco IOS XE devices.
A secure boot bypass vulnerability affecting Cisco IOS XE devices.
The version that knows your environment.
Query your assets running an affected version, and investigate the blast radius.
Every observed campaign linking this CVE to a named adversary.
Malware families riding this exploit, with evidence and IOCs.
YARA, Sigma, Snort, and vendor rules, auto-deployed to your SIEM.
Cross-references every affected SKU, including bundled OEM variants.
Community discussion across Reddit, Mastodon, and other social sources.