CVE-2026-48384 in ColdFusion
Summary
by MITRE • 08/12/2026
ColdFusion is affected by an Improper Input Validation vulnerability that could result in an application denial-of-service. An attacker with high privileges could exploit this vulnerability to crash the application, leading to a denial-of-service condition. Exploitation of this issue does not require user interaction.
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Analysis
by VulDB Data Team • 08/12/2026
This vulnerability represents a critical improper input validation flaw within Adobe ColdFusion applications that can lead to severe operational disruption through denial-of-service conditions. The weakness stems from insufficient validation mechanisms that fail to properly sanitize or verify incoming data inputs, creating opportunities for malicious actors to craft specific payloads that trigger application instability. The vulnerability specifically affects the application's handling of validated inputs, where malformed or unexpected data can cause the ColdFusion runtime environment to terminate unexpectedly or enter an unrecoverable state.
The technical exploitation of this vulnerability requires high privilege levels within the ColdFusion environment, indicating that attackers must already have elevated access rights before attempting to leverage this flaw. This privilege requirement suggests that the vulnerability may be present in administrative interfaces or management functions where input validation is particularly critical due to the sensitive nature of operations performed. The absence of user interaction requirements means that exploitation can occur automatically through automated tools or scripts without needing targeted user engagement, making it particularly dangerous for continuous attack scenarios.
From a cybersecurity perspective, this vulnerability aligns with CWE-20, which specifically addresses improper input validation as a fundamental weakness in software design and implementation. The operational impact extends beyond simple service interruption to potentially compromise the availability of critical business applications that depend on ColdFusion platforms. Organizations utilizing ColdFusion for web application hosting face significant risk exposure since this vulnerability can be leveraged to disrupt business operations without requiring extensive reconnaissance or complex attack vectors.
The exploitation pattern typically involves sending specially crafted inputs that bypass existing validation layers and trigger internal processing errors within the ColdFusion runtime. This may manifest through malformed parameters, unexpected data types, or overly long input sequences that cause memory allocation issues or stack overflow conditions. The vulnerability's impact is particularly concerning in enterprise environments where ColdFusion applications often serve as critical backend services for customer-facing applications, database interfaces, and integration platforms.
Security practitioners should implement immediate mitigations including strengthening input validation controls, implementing comprehensive monitoring for unusual processing patterns, and ensuring that privileged access is strictly controlled through proper authentication and authorization mechanisms. The vulnerability's classification under ATT&CK framework would likely map to privilege escalation techniques followed by denial-of-service operations, emphasizing the need for layered defensive strategies. Organizations should also consider deploying web application firewalls and input sanitization proxies to provide additional protection layers against such exploitation attempts while maintaining operational continuity through proper incident response procedures.