Intel Slim Bootloader: Out-of-bounds read in AuthenticateComponent
Summary
An out-of-bounds read in the AuthenticateComponent of the Intel Slim Bootloader, running within Ring 0 bare metal OS environments, may allow a local attacker to cause a denial of service. The attacker needs privileged local access and a low complexity attack; no user interaction is required. The impact is limited to availability of the affected system.
Affected
- Intel Slim Bootloader (affected versions: see Intel advisory INTEL-SA-01526; not confirmed in the sources reviewed)
- Affected processor families listed by Intel include 12th Generation Intel Core, Intel Pentium Gold, Intel Celeron (Alder Lake, Amston Lake, Arizona Beach) and Intel Processor N-series (Twin Lake)
Fixed in
Unknown. Check Intel advisory INTEL-SA-01526 and firmware updates from the device vendor.
Workaround
- No vendor mitigation confirmed in primary sources.
- Restrict local privileged (admin/root) access to affected systems.
Exploitation
- No evidence of exploitation in the wild found.
- No public proof-of-concept code found.
- Not confirmed in CISA KEV (not checked directly).
Our recommendation
- Verify whether any device in your environment runs Intel Slim Bootloader, for example embedded devices, IoT gateways or appliances; check with the device vendor.
- If affected, apply the firmware update from Intel or the OEM once the fixed versions are confirmed, and cover the whole advisory INTEL-SA-01526.
- Restrict local administrative access on affected systems and monitor for updates from Intel.
- Priority: low to medium, depending on whether the product is present.
Public exploits
PoC-in-GitHub, Metasploit and Exploit-DB list nothing for this CVE.
Research sources
- Intel advisory INTEL-SA-01526 intel.com
- Intel Security Center www.intel.com
- Strix CVE-2026-28746 www.strix.ai
- OffSeq Radar CVE-2026-28746 radar.offseq.com
Researched and written up in English and German by an AI (Claude by Anthropic) based on NVD, CISA, EPSS and the sources listed. The vendor information is authoritative. Researched on 11 Nov 2026, 11:35.
Original description (NVD)
Out-of-bounds read in the AuthenticateComponent for the Intel(R) Slim Bootloader within Ring 0: Bare Metal OS may allow a denial of service. System software adversary with a privileged user combined with a low complexity attack may enable denial of service. This result may potentially occur via local access when attack requirements are not present without special internal knowledge and requires no user interaction. The potential vulnerability may impact the confidentiality (none), integrity (none) and availability (high) of the vulnerable system, resulting in subsequent system confidentiality (none), integrity (none) and availability (none) impacts.
Sources
The tracker combines official, freely usable data sources – updated continuously:
- NVD (NIST) – CVEs, rating (CVSS), affected products
- CISA KEV – vulnerabilities confirmed by CISA as actively exploited
- CISA Vulnrichment – CISA assessment (SSVC) in the official CVE record
- FIRST EPSS – probability of exploitation
- Microsoft MSRC – Patch Tuesday: vulnerabilities, severity, updates
- PoC-in-GitHub – public proof-of-concept repositories
- Metasploit (Rapid7) – modules of the Metasploit Framework
- Exploit-DB (OffSec) – archive of public exploits (links only)
- Patch days: official vendor pages (linked per vendor) (Vendor patch days)
This product uses data from the NVD API but is not endorsed or certified by the NVD. EPSS data © FIRST.org.
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