CVE-2025-9281VulnerabilityPublished 20 Jan 2026

CVE-2025-9281: Rockwell Automation ArmorStart® LT · Uncontrolled Resource Consumption

Affects Rockwell Automation ArmorStart® LTSource CVE Database V5

Not known to be exploited · CVSS 8.7 High.

Data as of 26 Oct 2026, 06:26 UTC

CVSS 4.0 base score

8.7High

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

EPSS: 0.6% chance of exploitation in 30 days – higher than 48% of CVEsExploit Prediction Scoring System: the likelihood attackers will use this flaw soon.

CVSS:4.0/AV:N/AC:L/AT:N/PR:N/UI:N/VC:N/VI:N/VA:H/SC:N/SI:N/SA:N

Attack Vector: Network
Attack Complexity: Low
Attack Requirements: None
Privileges Required: None
User Interaction: None
Vulnerable system confidentiality: None
Vulnerable system integrity: None
Vulnerable system availability: High
Subsequent system confidentiality: None
Subsequent system integrity: None
Subsequent system availability: None

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

Attack Vector: Network: The vulnerable system is bound to the network stack and the set of possible attackers extends beyond the other options listed below, 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: The attacker must take no measurable action to exploit the vulnerability. The attack requires no target-specific circumvention to exploit the vulnerability. An attacker can expect repeatable success against the vulnerable system.
Attack Requirements: None: The successful attack does not depend on the deployment and execution conditions of the vulnerable system. The attacker can expect to be able to reach the vulnerability and execute the exploit under all or most instances of the vulnerability.
Privileges Required: None: The attacker is unauthorized prior to attack, and therefore does not require any access to settings or files of the vulnerable system to carry out an attack.
User Interaction: None: The vulnerable system can be exploited without interaction from any human user, other than the attacker.
Vulnerable system confidentiality: None: There is no loss of confidentiality within the Vulnerable System.
Vulnerable system integrity: None: There is no loss of integrity within the Vulnerable System.
Vulnerable system availability: High: There is a total loss of availability, resulting in the attacker being able to fully deny access to resources in the Vulnerable System; 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 Vulnerable System (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).
Subsequent system confidentiality: None: There is no loss of confidentiality within the Subsequent System or all confidentiality impact is constrained to the Vulnerable System.
Subsequent system integrity: None: There is no loss of integrity within the Subsequent System or all integrity impact is constrained to the Vulnerable System.
Subsequent system availability: None: There is no impact to availability within the Subsequent System or all availability impact is constrained to the Vulnerable System.

Definitions: FIRST CVSS v4.0 specification.

Exploitation evidence

Disclosed: evidence found.
CVE published 20 Jan 2026
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

Affected software

Product	Affected	Fixed in
Rockwell AutomationArmorStart® LT	Affected =V2.002 and below	Fixed in–

AI-suggested

1. Monitor Rockwell Automation's official channels for patches addressing CVE-2025-9281 and apply them promptly once released. 2. Until patches are available, implement network segmentation to isolate ArmorStart® LT devices from untrusted networks, limiting exposure to potential attackers. 3. Employ strict access controls and firewall rules to restrict network traffic to and from ArmorStart® LT devices, permitting only trusted management and monitoring systems. 4. Deploy continuous monitoring and anomaly detection solutions to identify unusual device behavior such as unexpected reboots or network traffic patterns indicative of exploitation attempts. 5. Conduct regular security assessments and penetration testing focused on industrial control systems to identify and remediate vulnerabilities proactively. 6. Develop and rehearse incident response plans specifically addressing denial-of-service scenarios in industrial environments to minimize downtime and safety risks. 7. Educate operational technology (OT) personnel about this vulnerability and best practices for secure device management. 8. Consider implementing redundant systems or failover mechanisms to maintain operational continuity in case of device failure. 9. Limit the use of Achilles Comprehensive step limit storm tests to controlled environments and avoid running them on production devices until the vulnerability is mitigated. 10. Collaborate with Rockwell Automation support for guidance and updates related to this vulnerability.

Description

A security issue exists within ArmorStart® LT that can result in a denial-of-service condition. During execution of the Achilles Comprehensive step limit storm tests, the device reboots

Impact

The primary impact of CVE-2025-9281 is on the availability of industrial control systems using ArmorStart® LT devices. A successful exploitation causes device reboots, resulting in denial-of-service conditions that can halt or disrupt manufacturing lines, motor control operations, and other automated processes dependent on these devices. For European organizations, this can lead to operational downtime, production losses, safety risks, and potential cascading effects on supply chains. Critical infrastructure sectors such as energy, manufacturing, transportation, and utilities that rely on Rockwell Automation products may experience significant operational interruptions. The lack of required authentication or user interaction increases the risk of remote exploitation by threat actors. Although no known exploits are currently in the wild, the vulnerability's characteristics make it an attractive target for attackers aiming to cause disruption or sabotage. The impact is particularly severe in environments where continuous operation is essential and device restarts can cause safety hazards or financial losses. Additionally, incident response and recovery efforts may be complicated by the difficulty in diagnosing the root cause of unexpected device reboots. Overall, the vulnerability poses a high operational risk to European industrial entities using ArmorStart® LT.

CWE-400Uncontrolled Resource Consumption (opens in a new tab)
Class weaknessLikelihood of exploit: High
The product does not properly control the allocation and maintenance of a limited resource.
MITRE discourages mapping vulnerabilities to this broad entry; the root cause is usually a more specific weakness.
Architecture and Design
Design throttling mechanisms into the system architecture. The best protection is to limit the amount of resources that an unauthorized user can cause to be expended. A strong authentication and access control model will help prevent such attacks from occurring in the first place.
Architecture and Design
Mitigation of resource exhaustion attacks requires that the target system either: recognizes the attack and denies that user further access for a given amount of time, or; uniformly throttles all requests in order to make it more difficult to consume resources more quickly than they can again be freed.
Architecture and Design
Ensure that protocols have specific limits of scale placed on them.
OWASP Cheat Sheets
File Upload (opens in a new tab)
OWASP ASVS 4.0.3
V12.1.1 (opens in a new tab)
Attack patterns
XML Ping of the Death (opens in a new tab)
Regular Expression Exponential Blowup (opens in a new tab)
Sustained Client Engagement (opens in a new tab)
From MITRE CWE, MITRE CAPEC and OWASP (Top 10, OpenCRE).

References

rockwellautomation.com/en-us/trust-center/security-advisories/advisory.SD1768.html (opens in a new tab)

Community reviews

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Exploitation evidence

What to do

Affected software

Description

AI analysisMachine-generated, updated 20 Jan 2026, 14:36 UTC

WeaknessesCWE-400

Technical details

References

Community reviews

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