Evidence used
- CISA confirms exploitation in the wild.
- Exploitation requires an existing local or physical foothold with privileges.
- EPSS is 1.02% for the current model date.
BlackTreeCVE IntelligenceFull vulnerability report · 2025
CVE-2025-22225High confidence
VMware ESXi Arbitrary Write Vulnerability
VMware · ESXi
8.2HighCVSS 3.1
Protect now
Fix not verifiedCISA confirms exploitation in the wild and lists 2025-03-25 as the remediation due date.
R
Open reassessment dashboard →Operational reassessment
Published severity in operational context
Published severityHigh→Operational priority:Critical, raised one band.upgradedsince 4 Mar 2025
Compensating controls
- Restrict local access and enforce least privilege on affected hosts.
- Increase monitoring for the attack path and post-exploitation behaviour described in the report.
Verification
- Confirm that the asset runs VMware ESXi and falls inside the recorded affected range.
- Recheck the vendor advisory before scheduling a change because no verified fixed version is currently retained.
- Validate exposure, authentication requirements and compensating controls in the actual environment.
- Reopen this reassessment when CVSS, KEV, EPSS, exploit evidence or remediation changes.
CISA confirms exploitation in the wild and lists 2025-03-25 as the remediation due date.
Fix not verified01
What, why and how
VMware ESXi contains an arbitrary write vulnerability. Successful exploitation allows an attacker with privileges within the VMX process to trigger an arbitrary kernel write leading to an escape of the sandbox.
What
VMware ESXi contains an arbitrary write vulnerability. Successful exploitation allows an attacker with privileges within the VMX process to trigger an arbitrary kernel write leading to an escape of the sandbox.
Why
Any condition where the attacker has the ability to write an arbitrary value to an arbitrary location, often as the result of a buffer overflow.
How
An attacker operating through local access may attempt exploitation with elevated privileges. If successful, the issue may cause the confidentiality, integrity or availability impact described by the vendor.
What
VMware ESXi contains an arbitrary write vulnerability. Successful exploitation allows an attacker with privileges within the VMX process to trigger an arbitrary kernel write leading to an escape of the sandbox.
Why
Any condition where the attacker has the ability to write an arbitrary value to an arbitrary location, often as the result of a buffer overflow.
How
An attacker operating through local access may attempt exploitation with elevated privileges. If successful, the issue may cause the confidentiality, integrity or availability impact described by the vendor.
02
Exploit reality and attack path
CVSS severity, EPSS forecast probability, public exploit material and CISA-confirmed exploitation are separate signals.
Observed exploitation Confirmed in the wild
?
Confirmed exploitation and public exploit material are separate signals. Attacks can occur without public proof-of-concept or exploit code.CISA added this CVE to its Known Exploited Vulnerabilities catalogue on 2025-03-04. Known ransomware campaign use is recorded.
Public PoC / exploit material None recorded
?
Confirmed exploitation and public exploit material are separate signals. Attacks can occur without public proof-of-concept or exploit code.No exploit-tagged reference or CISA SSVC proof-of-concept state is currently recorded. Research may still exist outside the structured feeds.
- Likely attack path
- local access → Write-what-where Condition → cause the confidentiality, integrity or availability impact described by the vendor
- Attack surface
- Local
- Privileges required
- High: elevated access is required
- User interaction
- None
- Attack complexity
- Low: no specialised conditions are recorded
- Security boundary
- Changed: exploitation can affect a different security authority
- Weakness
?
CWE means Common Weakness Enumeration: a standard category for the underlying weakness. - CWE-123 ↗
CWE-123: Write-what-where Condition. Any condition where the attacker has the ability to write an arbitrary value to an arbitrary location, often as the result of a buffer overflow.
- CVSS vector
?
CVSS means Common Vulnerability Scoring System. The vector records the metric values used to calculate technical severity. CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:L/PR:H/UI:N/S:C/C:H/I:H/A:HCommon Vulnerability Scoring System 3.1: the compact vector below is decoded into plain language.
AVLocalAttack vector: The attacker needs local access to the vulnerable system.ACLowAttack complexity: No specialised conditions are required beyond attacker-controlled input.PRHighPrivileges required: The attacker needs elevated or administrative privileges.UINoneUser interaction: No action by another user is required.SChangedScope: The attack can affect a component governed by a different security authority.CHighConfidentiality impact: A successful attack can cause a major loss.IHighIntegrity impact: A successful attack can cause a major loss.AHighAvailability impact: A successful attack can cause a major loss.- Post-exploitation / living off the land
- The issue can support a local privilege or sandbox boundary transition; normal system utilities may then be available in the gained context.
03
Patch and workaround
Operational remediation based on structured source evidence.
- Status
?
Patch availability is based on structured fixed-version fields and authoritative update references. If no fix is verified, check the vendor advisory before making a change. - Fix not verified
- Affected
- VMware ESXi: 8.0 < ESXi80U3d-24585383, 8.0 < ESXi80U2d-24585300, 7.0 < ESXi70U3s-24585291
- VMware Cloud Foundation: 5.x, 4.5.x
- VMware Telco Cloud Platform: 5.x, 4.x, 3.x, 2.x
- VMware Telco Cloud Infrastructure: 3.x, 2.x
- Fixed
- No fixed version is explicitly recorded in the structured CVE data.
- Action
- No verified patch reference is present in the current structured sources. Check the vendor advisory before making a change.
- Workaround
- No verified workaround is recorded. Limit untrusted access and use least privilege until authoritative guidance is available.
04
Evidence and provenance
Published 4 Mar 2025 · Last source change 4 Aug 2026, 03:55 UTC · CWE-123 · Write-what-where Condition
CVE recordCVE.org · 5.2
CVSS sourceCNA
EPSS source FIRST · tracked since 2026-08-14
?
The date BlackTree first stored a score for this CVE from the daily FIRST EPSS feed.European sourceENISA EUVD · EUVD-2025-7604
Product sourceCISA KEV
Remediation sourceCVE/CNA references
CWE sourceCISA ADP
NVD statusNVD enriched
Core structured fields are present and their contributing authorities are shown above.
Material change intelligence
View recent updates ↗What changed after publication
- Affected versionsThe structured affected or fixed version information changed.CNA ↗
- Before
- 8.0 < ESXi80U3d-24585383; 8.0 < ESXi80U2d-24585300; 7.0 < ESXi70U3s-24585291; 5.x, 4.5.x; 5.x, 4.x, 3.x, 2.x; 3.x, 2.x · Fixed: No fixed version is explicitly recorded in the structured CVE data.
- After
- VMware ESXi: 8.0 < ESXi80U3d-24585383, 8.0 < ESXi80U2d-24585300, 7.0 < ESXi70U3s-24585291; VMware Cloud Foundation: 5.x, 4.5.x; VMware Telco Cloud Platform: 5.x, 4.x, 3.x, 2.x; VMware Telco Cloud Infrastructure: 3.x, 2.x · Fixed: No fixed version is explicitly recorded in the structured CVE data.
Technical terms and abbreviations used in this report
- CVE
- Common Vulnerabilities and Exposures: the public identifier for one disclosed vulnerability.
- CVSS
- Common Vulnerability Scoring System: a technical severity framework; it is not patching priority by itself.
- EPSS
- Exploit Prediction Scoring System: FIRST's estimate of the probability that exploitation activity will be observed in the next 30 days; it is a forecast, not confirmation.
- CWE
- Common Weakness Enumeration: the standard category describing the underlying software or hardware weakness.
- CNA
- CVE Numbering Authority: an organisation authorised to assign and publish CVE records.
- CISA ADP
- Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency Authorized Data Publisher: structured enrichment added to a CVE record.
- NVD
- National Vulnerability Database: NIST's enrichment service for CVE records.
- CERT / CSIRT
- A computer security incident response team that publishes warnings or coordinates incident response.
- PoC
- Proof of concept: public material that demonstrates or helps reproduce exploitation.
- CSAF
- Common Security Advisory Framework: a machine-readable format for security advisories.
- LoTL
- Living off the land: abuse of legitimate tools or system functions during an attack.