NVD / CVE Program· CNA juniper

CVE-2023-28980: Junos OS and Junos OS Evolved: In a BGP rib sharding scenario an rpd crash will happen shortly after a specific CLI command is issued

Noroxi assessment

Priority: Monitor (action score 22/100)

The sources we track (CISA KEV, Exploit-DB, Metasploit, Nuclei, GitHub) show no public exploit code or exploitation in the wild.
Probability of exploitation in the next 30 days: 0.17% (FIRST EPSS).
Someone with local access to the system can trigger it. A low-privileged account is enough. No user action is required. No special conditions are required; it is repeatable.
Fixed version: Juniper Networks Junos OS 20.2R3-S6, 20.3R3-S5, 20.4R3-S4; Juniper Networks Junos OS Evolved 20.4R3-S6-EVO, 21.2R3-S4-EVO, 21.3R3-S1-EVO.

Low priority for now. Upgrade to Juniper Networks Junos OS 20.2R3-S6, 20.3R3-S5, 20.4R3-S4; Juniper Networks Junos OS Evolved 20.4R3-S6-EVO, 21.2R3-S4-EVO, 21.3R3-S1-EVO or later.

Generated automatically from the record's data: CVSS (NVD and CNA), CISA KEV and SSVC, FIRST EPSS, exploit sources, fixed versions. How we calculate it

Primary sources: NVD · CVE.org · FIRST EPSS

A Use After Free vulnerability in the routing protocol daemon of Juniper Networks Junos OS and Junos OS Evolved allows a locally authenticated attacker with low privileges to cause Denial of Service (DoS). In a rib sharding scenario the rpd process will crash shortly after specific CLI command is issued. This issue is more likely to occur in a scenario with high route scale (>1M routes). This issue affects: Juniper Networks Junos OS * 20.2 version 20.2R3-S5 and later versions prior to 20.2R3-S6; * 20.3 version 20.3R3-S2 and later versions prior to 20.3R3-S5; * 20.4 version 20.4R3-S1 and later versions prior to 20.4R3-S4 * 21.1 version 21.1R3 and later versions prior to 21.1R3-S3; * 21.2 version 21.2R1-S2, 21.2R2-S1 and later versions prior to 21.2R3-S2; * 21.3 version 21.3R2 and later versions prior to 21.3R3; * 21.4 versions prior to 21.4R2-S1, 21.4R3; * 22.1 versions prior to 22.1R2. Juniper Networks Junos OS Evolved * 20.4-EVO version 20.4R3-S1-EVO and later versions prior to 20.4R3-S6-EVO; * 21.2-EVO version 21.2R1-S2-EVO and later versions prior to 21.2R3-S4-EVO; * 21.3-EVO version 21.3R2-EVO and later versions prior to 21.3R3-S1-EVO; * 21.4-EVO versions prior to 21.4R2-S1-EVO, 21.4R3-EVO; * 22.1-EVO versions prior to 22.1R2-EVO.

MediumCVSS 5.5 · v3.1—No exploit Fix available

Published: Apr 17, 2023
Updated: Jun 17, 2026
EPSS: 0.1% · 6th percentile
CWE: CWE-416

Report tools

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Action score

Monitor

Low priority for now.

CVSS: 22 / 40 · 5.5 / 10
CISA KEV: 0 / 30 · Not listed
EPSS: 0 / 30 · 0.1%

CISA SSVC decision

Exploitation: none
Automatable: no
Technical impact: partial

Vulnrichment: CISA's decision-tree inputs.

CNA vs NVD score

NVD: —
CNA · juniper: 5.5; NVD has not scored this yet; the score shown is the CNA’s.

The score given by the assigning authority versus NVD’s independent score. A gap means the severity is contested.

Get told when this record changes

Not in KEV: no record of exploitation in the wild
No public exploit code on record
A fix has been released

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Noroxi analysis

What does it mean in your environment?

The assessment above is generated automatically from the record's data; it doesn't know your environment. Our team verifies on your systems whether this vulnerability is actually exploitable and which mitigation is enough.

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Affected systems

Is your version affected?

Pick the product and type the version you run. It's compared with this record's version ranges in your browser; the version isn't sent anywhere.

Vendor	Product	CPE
juniper	junos	cpe:2.3:o:juniper:junos
juniper	junos os evolved	cpe:2.3:o:juniper:junos_os_evolved

Affected versions

NVD version ranges (for catalog products). Add the product to your stack with a version and matching uses these.

juniper junos20.2
juniper junos20.3
juniper junos20.4
juniper junos21.1
juniper junos21.2
juniper junos21.3
juniper junos21.4
juniper junos22.1
juniper junos os evolved20.4
juniper junos os evolved21.2
juniper junos os evolved21.3
juniper junos os evolved21.4
juniper junos os evolved22.1

Versions reported by the vendor

Affected version ranges reported by the assigning authority (juniper). Independent of NVD's CPE analysis and usually ahead of it.

Juniper Networks Junos OS
- 20.2R3-S5 and later · before 20.2R3-S6affected · semver
- 20.3R3-S2 and later · before 20.3R3-S5affected · semver
- 20.4R3-S1 and later · before 20.4R3-S4affected · semver
- 21.1R3 and later · before 21.1R3-S3affected · semver
- 21.2R1-S2, 21.2R2-S1 and later · before 21.2R3-S2affected · semver
- 21.3R2 and later · before 21.3R3affected · semver
- 21.4R1 and later · before 21.4R2-S1, 21.4R3affected · semver
- 22.1R1 and later · before 22.1R2affected · semver
Juniper Networks Junos OS Evolved
- 20.4R3-S1-EVO and later · before 20.4R3-S6-EVOaffected · semver
- 21.2R1-S2-EVO and later · before 21.2R3-S4-EVOaffected · semver
- 21.3R2-EVO and later · before 21.3R3-S1-EVOaffected · semver
- 21.4R1-EVO and later · before 21.4R2-S1-EVO, 21.4R3-EVOaffected · semver
- 22.1R1-EVO and later · before 22.1R2-EVOaffected · semver

Same product

juniper: all records

Other highest-scoring records for the same primary product.

CVE-2023-36845Junos OS: EX and SRX Series: A PHP vulnerability in J-Web allows an unauthenticated to control an important environment variableKEV
98Now
CVE-2023-36846Junos OS: SRX Series: A vulnerability in J-Web allows an unauthenticated attacker to upload arbitrary filesKEV
79This week
CVE-2023-36844Junos OS: EX Series: A PHP vulnerability in J-Web allows an unauthenticated attacker to control important environment variablesKEV
78This week

Published before and after this one in the same product

← EarlierCVE-2023-28976Apr 17, 2023 · Junos OS: MX Series: If a specific traffic rate goes above the DDoS threshold it will lead to an FPC crash
30Monitor
← EarlierCVE-2023-28979Apr 17, 2023 · Junos OS: In a 6PE scenario upon receipt of a specific IPv6 packet an integrity check fails
18Monitor
Later →CVE-2023-28981Apr 17, 2023 · Junos OS and Junos OS Evolved: If malformed IPv6 router advertisements are received, memory corruption will occur which causes an rpd crash
26Monitor

Remediation

Which version to upgrade to

Fix versions compiled from the vendor, package registries and Microsoft. Verify the vendor's note before upgrading.

Product / package	Fixed version	Source
Juniper Networks Junos OS	20.2R3-S6	Vendor (CNA)
Juniper Networks Junos OS	20.3R3-S5	Vendor (CNA)
Juniper Networks Junos OS	20.4R3-S4	Vendor (CNA)
Juniper Networks Junos OS	21.1R3-S3	Vendor (CNA)
Juniper Networks Junos OS	21.2R3-S2	Vendor (CNA)
Juniper Networks Junos OS	21.3R3	Vendor (CNA)
Juniper Networks Junos OS	21.4R2-S1, 21.4R3	Vendor (CNA)
Juniper Networks Junos OS	22.1R2	Vendor (CNA)
Juniper Networks Junos OS Evolved	20.4R3-S6-EVO	Vendor (CNA)
Juniper Networks Junos OS Evolved	21.2R3-S4-EVO	Vendor (CNA)
Juniper Networks Junos OS Evolved	21.3R3-S1-EVO	Vendor (CNA)
Juniper Networks Junos OS Evolved	21.4R2-S1-EVO, 21.4R3-EVO	Vendor (CNA)
Juniper Networks Junos OS Evolved	22.1R2-EVO	Vendor (CNA)

Exploit status

No known public exploit

No public exploit has been observed yet. That doesn't mean you're safe, only that the bar is a little higher.

Research context

For pentesters and researchers: attack profile, score disagreement, timeline, patch commits, credits, variant and chain candidates, bug bounty scope. All derived from existing data; no exploit code.

Timeline

From publication to today: proof of concept, Metasploit module, CISA KEV and fix record. Dates are as reported by the sources.

No dated events beyond publication.

No history yet (it accumulates with the daily EPSS job).

Patch and commit links

Commit, PR and diff links among the references. A starting point for patch-diffing and variant hunting; fixes, not exploits.

No commit or PR link among the references.

Credits

All researchers

Finders, reporters and analysts named in the CNA record. Click a name for that researcher’s other records.

No credits in the CNA record.

Variant candidates

Same product, same weakness class, within 18 months. If the patch missed the root cause, the sibling bug is here.

No nightly-computed relations.

Chain candidates

An authentication bypass and a privilege-requiring bug in the same product, published close together: combined they may become an unauthenticated path.

—

Bug bounty scope

No known public program.

Source: bounty-targets-data (public HackerOne, Bugcrowd, Intigriti, YesWeHack listings).

Technical details

Attack conditions

Someone with local access to the system can trigger it.
A low-privileged account is enough.
No user action is required.
No special conditions are required; it is repeatable.

If successful

Confidentiality: none
Integrity: none
Availability: high · the service can be disrupted

Attack vector: Local
Attack complexity: Low
Privileges required: Low
User interaction: None
Scope: Unchanged
Confidentiality impact: None
Integrity impact: None
Availability impact: High

Weakness class (CWE)

CWE-416 · Use After Free

CVSS vector

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

nvd-secondary

Root cause

After a memory region is freed, another reference pointing to it is still used. By then, the same region may have been allocated for different data.

The bug in code

The whole CWE-416 class

A representative example of this vulnerability class. Not the vendor's source code; it shows the faulty pattern and its fix.

Vulnerable

1free(dev->buf);
2/* ... another thread is still running ... */
3process(dev->buf);

Fixed

1lock(&dev->lock);
2free(dev->buf);
3dev->buf = NULL;
4unlock(&dev->lock);

Attack context

MITRE CAPEC attack patterns and ATT&CK techniques for this weakness class (CWE). A starting point for detection rules and threat hunting.

MITRE has no CAPEC/ATT&CK mapping for this CWE.

Change log

Fix✗ → ✓Sep 28, 2026, 10:11 PM UTC

For records you follow, these changes also arrive as notifications. →

References

supportportal.juniper.net/JSA70606

Vendor advisories and official records. Exploit/PoC links are deliberately left out.

All records