CVE-2026-106571 in ImageMagick
Summary
by MITRE • 10/07/2026
ImageMagick is free and open-source software used for editing and manipulating digital images. Prior to 6.9.13-56 and 7.1.2-31, a crafted local call to the GetVirtualPixels API can trigger an integer calculation error and write beyond a heap buffer, crashing the server process. This issue is fixed in versions 6.9.13-56 and 7.1.2-31.
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Analysis
by VulDB Data Team • 10/07/2026
ImageMagick serves as a foundational component in many digital imaging pipelines, providing robust capabilities for editing, converting, and manipulating various image formats across diverse software ecosystems. The vulnerability identified within versions prior to 6.9.13-56 and 7.1.2-31 highlights a critical flaw in the internal pixel handling mechanisms of the library. Specifically, the issue resides in the GetVirtualPixels API function, which is designed to retrieve virtual pixels from an image without necessarily loading them into physical memory immediately. This optimization is crucial for performance but introduces complexity in boundary checking and buffer management that can be exploited under specific conditions.
The core technical flaw involves an integer calculation error during the processing of crafted local calls to this API. When a maliciously constructed input triggers this code path, arithmetic operations related to pixel coordinate calculations or memory allocation sizes may overflow or miscalculate due to insufficient validation of input parameters. This mathematical inconsistency leads to a heap buffer overread condition where the application attempts to access memory beyond the allocated bounds of the virtual pixel array. The consequence is an out-of-bounds write operation that corrupts adjacent heap metadata or data structures, inevitably causing the server process handling ImageMagick operations to crash due to segmentation faults or general protection violations.
From a security impact perspective, this vulnerability primarily manifests as a denial of service against services relying on ImageMagick for image processing tasks such as web applications, content management systems, or automated media pipelines. An attacker who can supply crafted images through any interface that invokes the GetVirtualPixels function can trigger this crash repeatedly, rendering the associated service unavailable to legitimate users. While heap corruption vulnerabilities often carry risks of arbitrary code execution if memory layout is predictable and other exploitation primitives are present, in this specific context involving virtual pixels and local calls, the immediate observable effect is process instability and termination rather than direct remote code execution.
This vulnerability aligns with CWE-190, which describes integer overflow or wraparound errors that lead to subsequent security weaknesses such as buffer overflows. It also maps to ATT&CK technique T1499, Endpoint Denial of Service, where the attacker leverages resource exhaustion or application crashes to disrupt availability. The lack of rigorous bounds checking on arithmetic operations involving image dimensions and pixel offsets is a common pattern in legacy multimedia libraries that prioritize performance over strict input validation.
Mitigation strategies require immediate upgrading to ImageMagick version 6.9.13-56 or later, including the 7.x branch update to version 7.1.2-31 or newer, where these integer calculation checks and heap boundary validations have been corrected by the development team. For organizations unable to patch immediately due to dependency constraints, implementing input sanitization at the application layer is advisable. This includes validating image dimensions before passing them to ImageMagick APIs, restricting file uploads from untrusted sources, and deploying web application firewalls that can detect anomalous patterns in uploaded files or API requests associated with this vulnerability. Additionally, running services using ImageMagick within sandboxed environments or containers limits the blast radius of potential crashes and prevents local privilege escalation attempts that might exploit heap corruption states.