CVE-2015-2384 in Internet Explorer
Summary
by MITRE
Microsoft Internet Explorer 11 allows remote attackers to execute arbitrary code or cause a denial of service (memory corruption) via a crafted web site, aka "Internet Explorer Memory Corruption Vulnerability," a different vulnerability than CVE-2015-2383 and CVE-2015-2425.
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Analysis
by VulDB Data Team • 05/31/2022
Microsoft Internet Explorer 11 contains a critical memory corruption vulnerability that enables remote attackers to execute arbitrary code or cause denial of service conditions through maliciously crafted web content. This vulnerability represents a distinct issue from related CVE-2015-2383 and CVE-2015-2425, indicating separate code paths and exploitation mechanisms. The flaw manifests when Internet Explorer processes specially crafted web pages, leading to improper memory handling that can be leveraged by attackers to gain unauthorized system access or disrupt service availability. This vulnerability falls under the CWE-125 weakness category, specifically representing an out-of-bounds read condition where the browser fails to properly validate memory access boundaries during web page rendering operations. The attack surface extends to any user who visits a compromised website while using Internet Explorer 11, making it particularly dangerous in environments where users may encounter malicious content through phishing campaigns, compromised websites, or drive-by download scenarios. According to the ATT&CK framework, this vulnerability maps to the T1059.001 technique for command and script interpreter, as successful exploitation could enable attackers to execute arbitrary commands on the target system through the browser's memory corruption. The memory corruption occurs during the processing of web content, specifically when the browser attempts to handle malformed or unexpected data structures, leading to unpredictable behavior that attackers can manipulate for malicious purposes. The vulnerability's impact is significant as it provides attackers with a potential path to full system compromise, allowing for privilege escalation, data exfiltration, and persistent access to affected systems. Organizations running Internet Explorer 11 are particularly at risk since this browser continues to be widely deployed in enterprise environments, creating a substantial attack surface for threat actors targeting legacy browser implementations. The exploitation mechanism relies on the browser's failure to properly validate input data during memory allocation and deallocation processes, creating opportunities for attackers to inject malicious code that executes within the browser's memory space. This particular vulnerability demonstrates the ongoing challenges with browser security implementations and highlights the importance of timely patch management for legacy software components. The memory corruption issue represents a fundamental flaw in Internet Explorer's memory management subsystem, where proper bounds checking and validation mechanisms fail to prevent malicious data from corrupting critical memory regions. Security researchers have identified that this vulnerability can be triggered through various web page elements including JavaScript execution, HTML parsing, and object handling, making it particularly challenging to defend against through traditional network-based security controls. The vulnerability's classification as a memory corruption issue aligns with common patterns seen in browser exploits where attackers target memory management functions to achieve code execution. Organizations should prioritize immediate patch deployment and consider browser migration strategies to reduce exposure to this and similar vulnerabilities in legacy Internet Explorer implementations. The ATT&CK framework categorizes this vulnerability under multiple techniques including T1203 for Exploitation for Client Execution and T1068 for Exploitation for Privilege Escalation, emphasizing the multi-stage nature of potential attacks leveraging this memory corruption flaw. This vulnerability underscores the critical need for comprehensive browser security assessments and continuous monitoring of browser-based attack vectors in enterprise security programs.
The technical exploitation of CVE-2015-2384 requires attackers to craft web content that triggers specific memory corruption patterns within Internet Explorer 11's rendering engine. This process typically involves manipulating JavaScript objects, DOM elements, or memory allocation sequences that cause the browser to improperly handle memory regions, leading to code execution or system instability. The vulnerability's occurrence in the browser's memory management subsystem indicates that attackers can exploit memory layout assumptions or buffer handling inconsistencies to overwrite critical memory structures. Security professionals should note that this vulnerability operates at a low level within the browser architecture, making it particularly difficult to detect through standard network monitoring or application layer security controls. The memory corruption can manifest as heap-based or stack-based issues, depending on how the malicious input is structured and processed by Internet Explorer's JavaScript engine. This type of vulnerability represents a classic example of how memory safety issues in complex software systems can create exploitable conditions for remote code execution. The vulnerability's relationship to other related CVEs demonstrates that Microsoft's browser security team identified multiple distinct memory corruption paths within the same browser implementation, highlighting the complexity of securing modern web browsers. Organizations implementing defensive measures should consider browser sandboxing, network segmentation, and user education to reduce the risk of successful exploitation attempts. The vulnerability's impact extends beyond simple code execution to include potential privilege escalation opportunities, as attackers can leverage the memory corruption to gain elevated system privileges. This particular flaw emphasizes the ongoing security challenges with legacy browser implementations and the need for organizations to maintain up-to-date security practices for all browser versions in use across their networks.