Cyber Resilience

CVE-2025-8040

Memory Safety in Mozilla Firefox ≤ 140.1

Memory Safety
Published
22 July 2025
Modified
17 June 2026
Patch / advisory
View advisory
CVSS Score v3.1 8.8
Click a component to see what it means
Raw vectorCVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:R/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:H
EPSS Score 0.0030 23th percentile
Risk Priority 64 floored blend · peak EPSS

Summary

CVE-2025-8040 is a high-severity Improper Restriction of Operations within the Bounds of a Memory Buffer (CWE-119) vulnerability in Mozilla Firefox. Its CVSS base score is 8.8 (High).

Operationally, exploitation aligns with the MITRE ATT&CK technique Process Injection (T1055); ranked at the 23th percentile by exploit likelihood (below the median); it is not currently listed in the CISA KEV catalog.

The strongest mitigations our analysis identified map to SA-8 (Security and Privacy Engineering Principles) and SI-10 (Information Input Validation) — see the control section below for these in your framework.

Deeper analysis AI-assisted summary

Synthesised by an AI model from the NVD description and linked references — a reading aid, not an authoritative source.

CVE-2025-8040 is a set of memory safety bugs (CWE-119) affecting Firefox ESR 140.0, Thunderbird ESR 140.0, Firefox 140, and Thunderbird 140. These bugs involve improper restriction of operations within memory bounds, with some demonstrating evidence of memory corruption. Mozilla presumes that sufficient effort could enable exploitation for arbitrary code execution.

Attackers can exploit this vulnerability remotely over the network with low complexity and no required privileges, but it necessitates user interaction, such as visiting a malicious site or engaging with crafted content. Successful exploitation could result in high-impact confidentiality, integrity, and availability violations (CVSS 8.8: AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:R/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:H), potentially allowing arbitrary code execution within the browser or mail client context.

Mozilla's security advisories (MFSA 2025-56, 59, 61, 63) and related Bugzilla entries detail the fixes applied in Firefox 141, Firefox ESR 140.1, Thunderbird 141, and Thunderbird 140.1. Security practitioners should prioritize updating affected installations to these patched versions to mitigate the risk.

EU & UK References

Vulnerability Data

Memory safety bugs present in Firefox ESR 140.0, Thunderbird ESR 140.0, Firefox 140 and Thunderbird 140. Some of these bugs showed evidence of memory corruption and we presume that with enough effort some of these could have been exploited to…

more

run arbitrary code. This vulnerability was fixed in Firefox 141, Firefox ESR 140.1, Thunderbird 141, and Thunderbird 140.1.

CWE(s)
CWE-119

Related Threats

MITRE ATT&CK Enterprise Techniques

T1055 Process Injection Stealth
Adversaries may inject code into processes in order to evade process-based defenses as well as possibly elevate privileges.
attack.mitre.org →
T1068 Exploitation for Privilege Escalation Privilege Escalation
Adversaries may exploit software vulnerabilities in an attempt to elevate privileges.
attack.mitre.org →
T1190 Exploit Public-Facing Application Initial Access
Adversaries may attempt to exploit a weakness in an Internet-facing host or system to initially access a network.
attack.mitre.org →
T1203 Exploitation for Client Execution Execution
Adversaries may exploit software vulnerabilities in client applications to execute code.
attack.mitre.org →
T1210 Exploitation of Remote Services Lateral Movement
Adversaries may exploit remote services to gain unauthorized access to internal systems once inside of a network.
attack.mitre.org →
T1212 Exploitation for Credential Access Credential Access
Adversaries may exploit software vulnerabilities in an attempt to collect credentials.
attack.mitre.org →
Derived from this CVE’s CWE(s) via the direct CWE→ATT&CK cross-walk.

CVEs Like This One

CVE-2026-16393Same product: Mozilla Firefox
CVE-2025-10537Same product: Mozilla Firefox
CVE-2024-9402Same product: Mozilla Firefox
CVE-2026-2788Same product: Mozilla Firefox
CVE-2025-8035Same product: Mozilla Firefox
CVE-2026-0892Same product: Mozilla Firefox
CVE-2026-12305Same product: Mozilla Firefox
CVE-2026-2773Same product: Mozilla Firefox
CVE-2026-6776Same product: Mozilla Firefox
CVE-2026-12300Same product: Mozilla Firefox

Affected Assets

mozilla
firefox
≤ 140.1 · ≤ 141.0
mozilla
thunderbird
≤ 140.1 · ≤ 141.0

Mitigating Controls

Control response

Prevent
Stop it (NIST 800-53)

—

Detect
Catch it (NIST detect / respond)

—

Harden
Shrink the surface (DISA STIG)

—

Validate
Prove the fix (OWASP ASVS)
  • V17.3.2

Mitigating Controls (NIST 800-53 r5) AI

SA-8 Security and Privacy Engineering Principles partial match

Secure engineering principles require memory-safe design and coding that structurally avoids buffer-boundary violations.

SI-10 Information Input Validation partial match

Input validation directly enforces bounds checking that stops out-of-bounds reads/writes from being introduced or reached.

SI-16 Memory Protection partial match

Memory protection restricts exploitation impact of buffer overflows without eliminating the underlying coding flaw.

Mitigating Controls (NIST CSF 2.0) AI

Derived directly from the weakness types (CWEs) cited in the NVD entry via our AI-authored CWE→CSF cross-walk (authority under review) — links open the control.

PR.PS-06 mostly match
prevents

Secure SDLC practices (bounds checking, safe APIs, reviews) directly prevent this class of flaw.

ID.RA-01 partial match
prevents

Vulnerability scanning and code analysis directly surface buffer-boundary flaws.

ID.RA-08 partial match
prevents

Receiving and triaging vulnerability disclosures commonly includes buffer-related reports.

PR.AT-02 partial match
prevents

Developer training on secure coding reduces introduction of memory-buffer errors.

PR.PS-02 partial match
prevents

Patching replaces vulnerable code containing buffer-boundary defects.

Mitigating Controls (ISO/IEC 27001:2022 Annex A) AI

Derived directly from the weakness types (CWEs) cited in the NVD entry via our AI-authored CWE→ISO cross-walk (authority under review) — links open the control.

A.8.29 Security testing in development and acceptance mostly match
finds

Security testing in development catches out-of-bounds accesses before release, covering most instances of the weakness.

A.8.25 Secure development life cycle partial match
prevents

Secure development lifecycle mandates memory-safety practices that directly prevent buffer-boundary violations.

A.8.26 Application security requirements partial match
prevents

Application security requirements can specify memory-safety rules, but do not prescribe implementation details.

A.8.27 Secure system architecture and engineering principles partial match
prevents

Secure architecture and engineering principles include memory-safe design patterns that mitigate buffer overflows.

A.8.28 Secure coding partial match
prevents

Secure coding standards explicitly forbid unsafe buffer operations, directly eliminating CWE-119.

References