CVE-2010-1122 in Firefox
Summary
by MITRE
Unspecified vulnerability in Mozilla Firefox 3.5.x through 3.5.8 allows remote attackers to cause a denial of service (memory corruption and application crash) and possibly have unknown other impact via vectors that might involve compressed data, a different vulnerability than CVE-2010-1028.
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Analysis
by VulDB Data Team • 05/03/2026
This vulnerability affects mozilla firefox versions 3.5.x through 3.5.8 and represents a memory corruption issue that can be exploited remotely to cause denial of service conditions and potentially more severe impacts. The vulnerability specifically involves compressed data processing within the browser's handling of web content, making it particularly dangerous as it can be triggered through normal web browsing activities. The flaw is classified as unspecified in its exact nature but is distinct from CVE-2010-1028, indicating a separate code path for exploitation. This type of vulnerability falls under the category of memory safety issues that are commonly associated with buffer overflows, heap corruption, or other memory management errors that can lead to unpredictable behavior in software applications.
The technical implementation of this vulnerability likely involves improper handling of compressed data streams during the parsing or rendering of web content. When firefox processes compressed data such as gzip or deflate encoded content, the memory allocation and deallocation mechanisms may not properly validate input boundaries or handle malformed compressed streams. This can result in memory corruption that manifests as application crashes or potentially more serious security implications. The vulnerability's classification as a denial of service issue suggests that attackers can cause the browser to consume excessive memory resources or corrupt memory structures in a way that prevents normal operation. Such memory corruption vulnerabilities are particularly dangerous because they can potentially be chained with other exploits to achieve arbitrary code execution or privilege escalation.
From an operational impact perspective, this vulnerability presents significant risk to users who browse the web regularly, as it can be exploited through standard web content without requiring any special user interaction beyond visiting a malicious website. The fact that it affects a widely used browser version means that the potential attack surface is extensive, with millions of users potentially vulnerable. The vulnerability's potential for unknown other impacts suggests that while the primary effect is denial of service, there may be additional security implications that were not fully understood at the time of disclosure. This could include information disclosure, privilege escalation, or other security boundary violations that make the vulnerability more dangerous than initially apparent.
Mitigation strategies for this vulnerability should focus on immediate patching of affected firefox versions, as well as implementing network-level protections such as content filtering and web application firewalls that can detect and block malicious compressed content. Organizations should also consider implementing browser hardening measures and monitoring for unusual memory consumption patterns or crash reports that might indicate exploitation attempts. The vulnerability aligns with CWE-125, which covers out-of-bounds read conditions, and potentially CWE-787, which addresses out-of-bounds write operations. From an ATT&CK framework perspective, this vulnerability would map to techniques involving privilege escalation and denial of service, with potential for lateral movement if exploited successfully. Users should be educated about the importance of keeping browsers updated and avoiding untrusted websites, while security teams should monitor for indicators of compromise related to memory corruption exploits. The vulnerability demonstrates the critical importance of memory safety in web browsers and the need for comprehensive testing of data processing components, particularly those handling compressed or encoded content.