CVE-2008-5667 in VBA32 Personal Antivirus
Summary
by MITRE
The scanning engine in VirusBlokAda VBA32 Personal Antivirus 3.12.8.x allows remote attackers to cause a denial of service (memory corruption and application crash) via a malformed RAR archive.
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Analysis
by VulDB Data Team • 05/24/2025
The vulnerability identified as CVE-2008-5667 resides within the scanning engine of VirusBlokAda VBA32 Personal Antivirus version 3.12.8.x, representing a critical security flaw that enables remote attackers to execute denial of service attacks through specifically crafted malicious RAR archive files. This vulnerability demonstrates a classic memory corruption issue that occurs during the processing of malformed archive files, where the antivirus software fails to properly validate input data before attempting to parse and analyze the contents of the RAR archive. The flaw exists in the decompression and scanning logic that handles archive file formats, particularly affecting the RAR compression format which is widely used for file distribution across various platforms.
The technical nature of this vulnerability aligns with CWE-125, which describes out-of-bounds read conditions that can lead to memory corruption and system instability. When the vulnerable antivirus software encounters a malformed RAR archive, the scanning engine attempts to process corrupted or malformed data structures within the archive header or compression metadata without adequate bounds checking or input sanitization. This processing failure results in memory corruption that ultimately causes the application to crash or become unresponsive, effectively rendering the antivirus protection service unavailable to the end user. The vulnerability operates at the intersection of archive handling and memory management, where improper buffer handling during decompression leads to the execution of invalid memory access patterns.
From an operational perspective, this vulnerability presents significant risk to organizations and individual users who rely on the VirusBlokAda VBA32 Personal Antivirus for protection. The remote exploitation capability means that attackers can trigger the denial of service condition without requiring local access or credentials, making it particularly dangerous in environments where automated threat detection is critical. The impact extends beyond simple application instability as it can disrupt security operations and potentially provide cover for more sophisticated attacks that might exploit the system during the recovery period. The vulnerability affects the availability of security services, which directly contradicts the fundamental purpose of antivirus software, and could be leveraged by threat actors to disable security protections before launching additional attacks.
The attack vector for this vulnerability follows the ATT&CK framework's technique T1499.004, which covers "Utilities: Endpoint Denial of Service," where adversaries target endpoint security tools to disable protection mechanisms. Organizations should implement immediate mitigation strategies including disabling the RAR scanning functionality within the antivirus software, updating to patched versions of the software, and implementing network-based controls to prevent the delivery of potentially malicious RAR files. Additionally, security teams should consider implementing network segmentation and monitoring for unusual patterns of archive file processing that might indicate exploitation attempts. The vulnerability also highlights the importance of proper input validation and defensive programming practices in security software, as outlined in the OWASP Top Ten 2017 category A03: Injection, which emphasizes the need for robust sanitization of all external inputs to prevent memory corruption vulnerabilities.