CVE-2021-40089

An issue was discovered in PrimeKey EJBCA before 7.6.0. The General Purpose Custom Publisher, which is normally run to invoke a local script upon a publishing operation, was still able to run if the System Configuration setting Enable External Script Access was disabled. With this setting disabled it's not possible to create new such publishers, but existing publishers would continue to run.

Published: 2021-08-25 Last update: 2024-11-21 Assigner: [email protected] Source: [email protected]
NVD Status：Modified，CVE State: published
View at NVD, CVE.org, EUVD

CVE-2021-40089 is rated Low Risk (14/100): CVSS Low severity, with low exploitation likelihood (EPSS 0.05%). Low composite risk—no urgent action required; patch on your normal maintenance cycle and revisit priority if CVSS or EPSS increases.

Risk is dynamic; we continuously reassess and refresh what is shown on this page as upstream context changes.

Exploit prediction scoring system (EPSS) score for CVE-2021-40089

EPSS lead: Daily EPSS estimates relative likelihood of exploitation; percentile ranks this CVE among scored vulnerabilities (higher = more severe relative rank).

# Date Old EPSS score New EPSS score Delta (New - Old)
1 2025-03-17 0.04% 0.05% +0.01%
2 2023-03-07 0.89% 0.04% -0.84%
3 2022-04-01 — 0.89% —

Full EPSS history (6 records total)

Common vulnerability scoring system (CVSS) metrics for CVE-2021-40089

CVSS metrics for this CVE.

Base score Version Severity Vector Exploitability Impact Score source
2.3 3.1 LOW
CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:L/PR:H/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:L/A:N Click to expand
Attack vector (AV:L)
They already need access on the box, or another person has to do something wrong; it’s not a remote drive-by.
Attack complexity (AC:L)
Once they can reach the bug, pulling it off is straightforward—no weird race conditions or rare setup.
Privileges required (PR:H)
They need powerful rights—admin, root, or similar—before this pays off.
User interaction (UI:N)
Nobody has to click “OK” or open a trap file; it can work without a victim helping.
Scope (S:U)
Damage stays in the same “trust bubble” as the broken component—no big spill into unrelated systems.
Confidentiality (C:N)
Doesn’t really leak secrets in a meaningful way.
Integrity (I:L)
Attackers could change some data, but it’s limited—not everything goes.
Availability (A:N)
Service keeps running; no real outage angle.
 0.8 1.4 [email protected]
1.9 2.0 LOW
AV:L/AC:M/Au:N/C:N/I:P/A:N Click to expand
Access vector (AV:L)
Requires local access to the target system.
Access complexity (AC:M)
Exploitation needs some favorable conditions, but not exceptional ones.
Authentication (AU:N)
No authentication is required.
Confidentiality impact (C:N)
No confidentiality impact.
Integrity impact (I:P)
Partial integrity impact.
Availability impact (A:N)
No availability impact.
 3.4 2.9 [email protected]

Weakness enumeration for CVE-2021-40089

Affected software / configurations for CVE-2021-40089

Vendor Product Version Raw CPE
primekey ejbca < 7.6.0 cpe:2.3:a:primekey:ejbca:*:*:*:*:enterprise:*:*:*

References for CVE-2021-40089

cvelogic Threat Intelligence