CVE-2025-40597VulnerabilityPublished 23 Jul 2025Updated 26 Feb 2026

CVE-2025-40597: SonicWall SMA 100 Series · Heap-based Buffer Overflow

Affects SonicWall SMA 100 SeriesSource CVE Database V5

Not known to be exploited · 22% EPSS · CVSS 7.5 High.

Data as of 26 Oct 2026, 06:26 UTC

CVSS 3.1 base score

7.5High

How severe the flaw is on the 0–10 CVSS scale.

EPSS: 22.6% chance of exploitation in 30 days – higher than 97% of CVEsExploit Prediction Scoring System: the likelihood attackers will use this flaw soon.

CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:H

Attack Vector: Network
Attack Complexity: Low
Privileges Required: None
User Interaction: None
Scope: Unchanged
Confidentiality: None
Integrity: None
Availability: High

Bold values are the worst case: easiest to exploit or largest impact.

Attack Vector: Network: The vulnerable component is bound to the network stack and the set of possible attackers extends beyond the other options listed, up to and including the entire Internet. Such a vulnerability is often termed 'remotely exploitable' and can be thought of as an attack being exploitable at the protocol level one or more network hops away (e.g., across one or more routers).
Attack Complexity: Low: Specialized access conditions or extenuating circumstances do not exist. An attacker can expect repeatable success against the vulnerable component.
Privileges Required: None: The attacker is unauthorized prior to attack, and therefore does not require any access to settings or files to carry out an attack.
User Interaction: None: The vulnerable system can be exploited without any interaction from any user.
Scope: Unchanged: An exploited vulnerability can only affect resources managed by the same security authority. In this case, the vulnerable component and the impacted component are either the same, or both are managed by the same security authority.
Confidentiality: None: There is no loss of confidentiality within the impacted component.
Integrity: None: There is no loss of integrity within the impacted component.
Availability: High: There is total loss of availability, resulting in the attacker being able to fully deny access to resources in the impacted component; this loss is either sustained (while the attacker continues to deliver the attack) or persistent (the condition persists even after the attack has completed). Alternatively, the attacker has the ability to deny some availability, but the loss of availability presents a direct, serious consequence to the impacted component (e.g., the attacker cannot disrupt existing connections, but can prevent new connections; the attacker can repeatedly exploit a vulnerability that, in each instance of a successful attack, leaks a only small amount of memory, but after repeated exploitation causes a service to become completely unavailable).

Definitions: FIRST CVSS v3.1 specification.

Exploitation evidence

Disclosed: evidence found.
CVE published 23 Jul 2025
Detectable: no evidence on record.
No public nuclei template indexed
Weaponised: no evidence on record.
No public exploit code indexed in Metasploit or Exploit-DB
Exploited in the wildExploited: no evidence on record.
Not in CISA KEV and no source reports exploitation
Observed by OffSeq MirageSeen by Mirage: no evidence on record.
No attack traffic recorded by OffSeq Mirage sensors

A missing step is not evidence of safety. Sources: cve.org (opens in a new tab), the Metasploit, Exploit-DB and nuclei-templates index as of 2026-10-26.

Disclosed: The CVE record is public on cve.org. Its publication is t = 0.
Detectable: A public nuclei template can find exposed instances, for defenders and attackers alike.
Weaponised: Public exploit code exists in Metasploit or Exploit-DB, or CISA SSVC reports a public proof of concept.
Exploited in the wild: CISA KEV lists it, CISA SSVC rates exploitation active, or a source reports attacks.
Observed by OffSeq Mirage: OffSeq Mirage honeypot sensors recorded attack traffic for this CVE, or found exposed hosts without attack traffic.

Moments are spaced evenly, not to scale; a dashed line marks a gap of six months or more. Deltas count from t = 0. Sources that give only a date (CISA KEV, Exploit-DB, or a time of exactly 00:00Z) read “same day” rather than hours. Metasploit modules carry the flaw’s disclosure date, not their release date, and nuclei templates carry no date, so both appear above but not on the timeline.

What to do

AI-suggested

1. Immediately monitor SonicWall’s official channels for patches or firmware updates addressing CVE-2025-40597 and apply them as soon as they are released. 2. Until patches are available, restrict access to the SMA 100 Series web interface by implementing network-level controls such as IP whitelisting, VPN-only access, or firewall rules to limit exposure to trusted management networks. 3. Employ intrusion detection and prevention systems (IDS/IPS) with updated signatures to detect anomalous or malformed requests targeting the SMA web interface. 4. Conduct regular network traffic analysis to identify suspicious activity indicative of exploitation attempts, such as unusual request patterns or crashes of the SMA device. 5. Harden device configurations by disabling unnecessary services and interfaces, and ensure strong authentication mechanisms are enforced for administrative access. 6. Maintain comprehensive backups and incident response plans to quickly recover from potential denial of service or compromise scenarios. 7. Educate security teams and administrators about this vulnerability to ensure rapid detection and response. 8. Consider network segmentation to isolate the SMA devices from critical internal resources to limit lateral movement if compromise occurs.

Description

A Heap-based buffer overflow vulnerability in the SMA100 series web interface allows remote, unauthenticated attacker to cause Denial of Service (DoS) or potentially results in code execution.

Impact

The primary impact of CVE-2025-40597 is the potential for denial of service, which can disrupt remote access services critical for business continuity, especially in organizations relying on SonicWall SMA 100 Series appliances for secure VPN and remote connectivity. More severe exploitation could lead to arbitrary code execution, allowing attackers to gain control over the affected device, pivot into internal networks, exfiltrate sensitive data, or deploy further malware. Given the unauthenticated and network-accessible nature of the vulnerability, attackers can exploit it remotely without prior access, increasing the risk of widespread attacks. Organizations in sectors such as finance, healthcare, government, and critical infrastructure that depend on these devices for secure remote access are particularly vulnerable. The disruption or compromise of these devices could lead to significant operational downtime, data breaches, and erosion of trust. The absence of known exploits currently provides a window for mitigation, but the vulnerability’s characteristics make it a high-value target for threat actors once exploit code becomes available.

CWE-122Heap-based Buffer Overflow (opens in a new tab)
Variant weaknessLikelihood of exploit: HighCWE Top 25 (2025): #16
A heap overflow condition is a buffer overflow, where the buffer that can be overwritten is allocated in the heap portion of memory, generally meaning that the buffer was allocated using a routine such as malloc().
Pre-design: Use a language or compiler that performs automatic bounds checking.
Architecture and Design
Use an abstraction library to abstract away risky APIs. Not a complete solution.
Operation · Build and Compilation · Environment Hardening
Use automatic buffer overflow detection mechanisms that are offered by certain compilers or compiler extensions. Examples include: the Microsoft Visual Studio /GS flag, Fedora/Red Hat FORTIFY_SOURCE GCC flag, StackGuard, and ProPolice, which provide various mechanisms including canary-based detection and range/index…
OWASP Cheat Sheets
XML Security (opens in a new tab)
Mass Assignment (opens in a new tab)
OWASP ASVS 4.0.3
V13.3.1 (opens in a new tab)
V5.1.4 (opens in a new tab)
V5.1.3 (opens in a new tab)
Attack patterns
Forced Integer Overflow (opens in a new tab)
From MITRE CWE, MITRE CAPEC and OWASP (Top 10, OpenCRE).

References

psirt.global.sonicwall.com/vuln-detail/SNWLID-2025-0012 (opens in a new tab)

Community reviews

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Exploitation evidence

What to do

Description

AI analysisMachine-generated, updated 27 Feb 2026, 02:00 UTC

WeaknessesCWE-122

Technical details

References

Community reviews

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