Vulnerability Monitor

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CVE-2015-7268

Samsung 850 Pro and PM851 solid-state drives and Seagate ST500LT015 and ST500LT025 hard disk drives, when used on Windows and operating in Opal mode on Lenovo ThinkPad T440s laptops with BIOS 2.32 or ThinkPad W541 laptops with BIOS 2.21, or in Opal or eDrive mode on Dell Latitude E6410 laptops with BIOS A16 or Latitude E6430 laptops with BIOS A16, allow physically proximate attackers to bypass self-encrypting drive (SED) protection by triggering a soft reset and booting from an alternative OS, aka a "Forced Restart Attack."

Security Impact Summary

This vulnerability carries a MEDIUM severity rating with a CVSS v3.1 score of 4.2, but requires specific conditions to be met without requiring user interaction and does not require pre-existing privileges . The vulnerability impacts confidentiality (data exposure), for affected systems. Impacting 8 products from samsung, from samsung, from samsung and 5 others, organizations running these solutions should prioritize assessment and patching.

Historical Context

First disclosed in 2017, this vulnerability was reported during a period defined by widespread IoT adoption challenges, mobile security concerns, and the emergence of advanced persistent threat (APT) techniques. Contemporary mitigation strategies focused on secure development practices and third-party component vetting.

Published

2017-11-27T22:29:00.287

Last Modified

2025-04-20T01:37:25.860

Status

Deferred

Source

[email protected]

Severity

CVSSv3.0: 4.2 (MEDIUM)

CVSSv2 Vector

AV:L/AC:M/Au:N/C:P/I:N/A:N

Access Vector: LOCAL
Access Complexity: MEDIUM
Authentication: NONE
Confidentiality Impact: PARTIAL
Integrity Impact: NONE
Availability Impact: NONE

Exploitability Score

3.4

Impact Score

2.9

Weaknesses

Type: Primary
CWE-254

Affected Vendors & Products

Type	Vendor	Product	Version/Range	Vulnerable?
Operating System	samsung	850_pro_firmware	-	Yes
Hardware	samsung	850_pro	-	No
Operating System	samsung	pm851_firmware	-	Yes
Hardware	samsung	pm851	-	No
Operating System	seagate	st500lt015_firmware	-	Yes
Hardware	seagate	st500lt015	-	No
Operating System	seagate	st500lt025_firmware	-	Yes
Hardware	seagate	st500lt025	-	No

References

https://www.blackhat.com/docs/eu-15/materials/eu-15-Boteanu-Bypassing-Self-Encrypting-Drives-SED-In-Enterprise-Environments-wp.pdf Technical Description, Third Party Advisory ([email protected])
https://www.infoworld.com/article/3004913/encryption/self-encrypting-drives-are-hardly-any-better-than-software-based-encryption.html Technical Description, Third Party Advisory ([email protected])
https://www.blackhat.com/docs/eu-15/materials/eu-15-Boteanu-Bypassing-Self-Encrypting-Drives-SED-In-Enterprise-Environments-wp.pdf Technical Description, Third Party Advisory (af854a3a-2127-422b-91ae-364da2661108)
https://www.infoworld.com/article/3004913/encryption/self-encrypting-drives-are-hardly-any-better-than-software-based-encryption.html Technical Description, Third Party Advisory (af854a3a-2127-422b-91ae-364da2661108)

How SecUtils Interprets This CVE

SecUtils normalizes and enriches National Vulnerability Database (NVD) records by standardizing vendor and product identifiers, aggregating vulnerability metadata from both NVD and MITRE sources, and providing structured context for security teams. For samsung's affected products, we extract Common Platform Enumeration (CPE) data, Common Weakness Enumeration (CWE) classifications, CVSS severity metrics, and reference data to enable rapid vulnerability prioritization and asset correlation. This record contains no exploit code, proof-of-concept instructions, or attack methodologies—only defensive intelligence necessary for patch management, risk assessment, and security operations.