CVE-2015-3662 in QuickTime
Summary
by MITRE
QT Media Foundation in Apple QuickTime before 7.7.7, as used in OS X before 10.10.4 and other products, allows remote attackers to execute arbitrary code or cause a denial of service (memory corruption) via a crafted file, a different vulnerability than CVE-2015-3661, CVE-2015-3663, CVE-2015-3666, CVE-2015-3667, and CVE-2015-3668.
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Analysis
by VulDB Data Team • 05/22/2022
The vulnerability described in CVE-2015-3662 represents a critical memory corruption flaw within Apple QuickTime's QT Media Foundation component that affected multiple operating systems and applications. This vulnerability specifically impacted Apple QuickTime versions prior to 7.7.7 and was present in OS X versions before 10.10.4, making it a widespread issue that could affect numerous users and organizations relying on legacy QuickTime implementations. The flaw was classified as a remote code execution vulnerability, meaning attackers could exploit it without physical access to the target system, making it particularly dangerous in enterprise environments where users might encounter malicious files through email attachments, web downloads, or network shares.
The technical nature of this vulnerability stems from improper input validation and memory handling within the QT Media Foundation parser, which is responsible for processing multimedia files within the QuickTime framework. When the affected component encountered a crafted malicious file, it would fail to properly validate the file structure, leading to memory corruption that could be leveraged by attackers to execute arbitrary code on the target system. This type of vulnerability falls under CWE-125: Out-of-bounds Read, which is classified as a memory safety issue in the Common Weakness Enumeration catalog, and represents a classic buffer overflow scenario where insufficient bounds checking allows attackers to manipulate memory locations beyond intended boundaries. The vulnerability's exploitation potential was significant because it could be triggered through legitimate QuickTime media handling processes, making it difficult for users to distinguish between benign and malicious content.
The operational impact of this vulnerability was severe across multiple threat vectors, particularly in enterprise environments where QuickTime was widely deployed for multimedia content delivery. Attackers could craft specially designed media files that, when opened by an affected QuickTime implementation, would trigger the memory corruption and potentially allow remote code execution with the privileges of the user running the application. This meant that successful exploitation could result in complete system compromise, data exfiltration, or establishment of persistent backdoors. The vulnerability's relationship to other CVEs in the same year (CVE-2015-3661, CVE-2015-3663, CVE-2015-3666, CVE-2015-3667, and CVE-2015-3668) indicates that it was part of a coordinated set of vulnerabilities affecting Apple's multimedia processing frameworks, suggesting a systemic weakness in the underlying media handling infrastructure that required comprehensive patching across multiple components.
From a threat modeling perspective, this vulnerability aligns with ATT&CK technique T1059.007 for Command and Scripting Interpreter: PowerShell, though more accurately represents T1203: Exploitation for Client Execution within the attack lifecycle. The vulnerability's exploitation pathway typically involved social engineering campaigns where users would be tricked into opening malicious media files, often through phishing emails or compromised websites. Organizations implementing security controls would need to focus on application whitelisting, sandboxing QuickTime processes, and ensuring prompt patch deployment across all affected systems. The remediation approach required immediate installation of Apple's security updates, which included patches to the QT Media Foundation component to properly validate file structures and prevent memory corruption scenarios. Additionally, network security controls such as email filtering and web proxies could help reduce the attack surface by blocking suspicious media file attachments before they reached end-user systems, though this was not a complete defense given the nature of the vulnerability requiring system-level patching.