CVE-2025-26416
Published: 02 September 2025
Summary
CVE-2025-26416 is a critical-severity Heap-based Buffer Overflow (CWE-122) vulnerability in Google Android. Its CVSS base score is 9.8 (Critical).
Operationally, exploitation aligns with the MITRE ATT&CK technique Exploitation for Privilege Escalation (T1068); ranked at the 47.6th percentile by exploit likelihood (below the median); it is not currently listed in the CISA KEV catalog.
The strongest mitigations our analysis identified are NIST 800-53 RA-5 (Vulnerability Monitoring and Scanning) and SI-16 (Memory Protection).
Threat & Defense at a Glance
Threat & Defense Details
Mitigating Controls (NIST 800-53 r5)AI
Directly requires identification, reporting, and correction of flaws like the heap buffer overflow in Skia via patching as detailed in the Android Security Bulletin.
Implements memory protections such as ASLR and DEP to prevent exploitation of the out-of-bounds write leading to remote privilege escalation.
Scans for vulnerabilities like CVE-2025-26416 in the system, enabling timely detection and prioritization for remediation.
MITRE ATT&CK Enterprise TechniquesAI
Why these techniques?
Heap buffer overflow in Skia enables remote unauthenticated exploitation for privilege escalation on Android.
NVD Description
In initializeSwizzler of SkBmpStandardCodec.cpp, there is a possible out of bounds write due to a heap buffer overflow. This could lead to remote escalation of privilege with no additional execution privileges needed. User interaction is not needed for exploitation.
Deeper analysisAI
CVE-2025-26416 is a heap buffer overflow vulnerability in the initializeSwizzler function of SkBmpStandardCodec.cpp within the Skia graphics library, as integrated into the Android platform. This flaw enables an out-of-bounds write (CWE-122) and was published on 2025-09-02.
The vulnerability can be exploited remotely by any unauthenticated attacker (PR:N) over the network (AV:N) with low attack complexity (AC:L) and no user interaction (UI:N) required. Successful exploitation could lead to remote escalation of privilege, with high impacts on confidentiality, integrity, and availability (C:H/I:H/A:H), as reflected in its CVSS v3.1 base score of 9.8.
The Android Security Bulletin for 2025-04-01 details mitigation at https://source.android.com/security/bulletin/2025-04-01, and a specific patch is available in the Skia codebase at https://android.googlesource.com/platform/external/skia/+/fc2ebb312c5898486776df981a51c2bb90e3756d.
Details
- CWE(s)