A few links about CVE-2012-0217—the SYSRET vulnerability. A difference in behavior on Intel CPUs compared to other x86 CPUs that allowed Arbitrary Code Execution on kernels and hypervisors. The first link below is from a presentation at Black Hat by the researcher who discovered it. The second link, if I am not mistaken, is the first public exploit for that vulnerability, achieving Privilege Escalation on FreeBSD. Then I found two blog posts from the now-defunct company VUPEN, detailing how they exploited it on Windows and Xen. The last two links are the official blog post from the Xen Project and a technical write-up from NCC Group about exploiting Xen based on the VUPEN article. A Stitch in Time Saves Nine: A Case of Multiple Operating System Vulnerability https://media.blackhat.com/bh-us-12/Briefings/Wojtczuk/BH_US_12_Wojtczuk_A_Stitch_In_Time_Slides.pdf CVE-2012-0217: Intel's sysret Kernel Privilege Escalation (on FreeBSD) https://fail0verflow.com/blog/2012/cve-2012-0217-intel-sysret-freebsd/ Advanced Exploitation of Windows Kernel Intel 64-Bit Mode Sysret Vulnerability (MS12-042) https://web.archive.org/web/20120824020724/http://www.vupen.com/blog/20120806.Advanced_Exploitation_of_Windows_Kernel_x64_Sysret_EoP_MS12-042_CVE-2012-0217.php Advanced Exploitation of Xen Hypervisor Sysret VM Escape Vulnerability https://web.archive.org/web/20120908033139/http://www.vupen.com/blog/20120904.Advanced_Exploitation_of_Xen_Sysret_VM_Escape_CVE-2012-0217.php The Intel SYSRET privilege escalation https://xenproject.org/blog/the-intel-sysret-privilege-escalation/ Adventures in Xen Exploitation https://www.nccgroup.com/research/adventures-in-xen-exploitation/
Post summary
The post lists multiple references that provide a public exploit and detailed exploitation techniques for CVE‑2012‑0217 across FreeBSD, Windows, and Xen, highlighting the Intel SYSRET privilege‑escalation flaw.