Cyber Resilience

CVE-2026-20644

Memory Safety in Apple Ipados ≤ 18.7.5

Memory Safety
Published
11 February 2026
Modified
15 July 2026
Patch / advisory
View advisory
CVSS Score v3.1 6.5
Click a component to see what it means
Raw vectorCVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:R/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:H
EPSS Score 0.0029 22th percentile
Risk Priority 49 floored blend · peak EPSS

Summary

CVE-2026-20644 is a medium-severity Improper Restriction of Operations within the Bounds of a Memory Buffer (CWE-119) vulnerability in Apple Ipados. Its CVSS base score is 6.5 (Medium).

Operationally, exploitation aligns with the MITRE ATT&CK technique Exploitation for Privilege Escalation (T1068); ranked at the 22th 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-11 (Developer Testing and Evaluation) and SI-10 (Information Input Validation) — see the control section below for these in your framework.

EU & UK References

Vulnerability Data

The issue was addressed with improved memory handling. This issue is fixed in Safari 26.3, iOS 18.7.5 and iPadOS 18.7.5, iOS 26.3 and iPadOS 26.3, macOS Tahoe 26.3, visionOS 26.3. Processing maliciously crafted web content may lead to an unexpected…

more

process crash.

CWE(s)
CWE-119CWE-416CWE-787CWE-120

Related Threats

MITRE ATT&CK Enterprise Techniques

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 →
T1211 Exploitation for Stealth Stealth
Adversaries may exploit vulnerabilities to evade detection by hiding activity, suppressing logging, or operating within trusted or unmonitored components.
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-2026-28857Same product: Apple Ipados
CVE-2026-20664Same product: Apple Ipados
CVE-2025-43501Same product: Apple Ipados
CVE-2026-20636Same product: Apple Ipados
CVE-2023-43010Same product: Apple Ipados
CVE-2026-28859Same product: Apple Ipados
CVE-2025-43433Same product: Apple Ipados
CVE-2025-43214Same product: Apple Ipados
CVE-2026-20635Same product: Apple Ipados
CVE-2025-31223Same product: Apple Ipados

Affected Assets

apple
safari
≤ 26.3
apple
ipados
≤ 18.7.5 · 26.0 — 26.3
apple
iphone os
≤ 18.7.5 · 26.0 — 26.3
apple
macos
≤ 26.3
apple
visionos
≤ 26.3

Mitigating Controls

Control response

Prevent
Stop it (NIST 800-53)

—

Detect
Catch it (NIST detect / respond)

—

Harden
Shrink the surface (DISA STIG)
  • 3 hardening rules · 3 OS baselines
Validate
Prove the fix (OWASP ASVS)
  • V17.3.2
  • V5.2.1
  • V1.4.3

Mitigating Controls (NIST 800-53 r5) AI

SA-11 Developer Testing and Evaluation good match

Developer testing and evaluation can discover use-after-free bugs through dynamic analysis or fuzzing.

SI-10 Information Input Validation good match

Input validation directly enforces size checks before buffer copies.

SA-15 Development Process, Standards, and Tools partial match

Requiring documented secure-development standards and tools can mandate bounds-checked coding practices that avoid the weakness.

SA-8 Security and Privacy Engineering Principles partial match

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

SC-39 Process Isolation partial match

Process isolation confines the blast radius of use-after-free memory corruption to a single execution domain.

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.8.28 Secure coding mostly match
prevents

Secure coding directly requires bounds-checked memory operations, addressing the root cause of CWE-120.

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.8.32 Change management partial match
prevents

Change-management processes help ensure memory-safety fixes are deployed consistently.

Hardening callouts derived

Configuration rules from DISA STIG baselines that bear on weaknesses of the type cited by this CVE. Each rule is shown with the relationship its mapping actually records, against the CWE it was authored against. Derived via CVE→CWE over `controls_xwalks` (authoritative rows only; rows rated `none` are excluded).

Oracle Linux 8 (1 rule)
  • V-248592 OL 8 must clear memory when it is freed to prevent use-after-free attacks. prevents CWE-416
RHEL 8 (1 rule)
  • V-230279 RHEL 8 must clear memory when it is freed to prevent use-after-free attacks. prevents CWE-416
RHEL 9 (1 rule)
  • V-257794 RHEL 9 must clear memory when it is freed to prevent use-after-free attacks. prevents CWE-416

References