Raw vector
CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:L/PR:N/UI:R/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:HSummary
CVE-2026-21500 is a medium-severity Improper Input Validation (CWE-20) vulnerability in Color Iccdev. Its CVSS base score is 5.5 (Medium).
Operationally, exploitation aligns with the MITRE ATT&CK technique OS Exhaustion Flood (T1499.001); ranked at the 9th percentile by exploit likelihood (below the median); it is not currently listed in the CISA KEV catalog; a public proof-of-concept is referenced.
The strongest mitigations our analysis identified map to SA-11 (Developer Testing and Evaluation) and SC-5 (Denial-of-service Protection) — 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-2026-21500 is a stack overflow vulnerability in the XML calculator macro expansion feature of iccDEV, a set of libraries and tools for interacting with, manipulating, and applying ICC color management profiles. The flaw affects iccDEV versions prior to 2.3.1.2 and has been assigned a CVSS v3.1 base score of 5.5 (AV:L/AC:L/PR:N/UI:R/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:H). It is associated with CWEs including CWE-20 (Improper Input Validation), CWE-400 (Uncontrolled Resource Consumption), CWE-674 (Uncontrolled Recursion), CWE-1119 (Excessive Data Query Operations), and CWE-787 (Out-of-bounds Write).
A local attacker with no privileges can exploit this vulnerability with low complexity by tricking a user into processing a malicious input, such as a crafted ICC profile or XML data involving macro expansion. Successful exploitation leads to a stack overflow, resulting in denial of service through application crash or instability, with no impact on confidentiality or integrity.
The vulnerability has been patched in iccDEV version 2.3.1.2, as detailed in the project's GitHub security advisory (GHSA-4h4j-mm9w-2cp4), issue tracker (#384), pull request (#406), and related commits (cce5f9b68a6c067b7ef898ccd5b000770745fb14 and f295826a6f15add90490030f23b2ddd8593bff5b). Security practitioners should update to the fixed version and validate inputs in color management workflows to mitigate risks.
OWASP Top 10 for Web (2025)
EU & UK References
- 🇪🇺 ENISA EUVD: EUVD-2026-1406
Vulnerability Data
iccDEV provides a set of libraries and tools that allow for the interaction, manipulation, and application of ICC color management profiles. Prior to version 2.3.1.2, iccDEV is vulnerable to stack overflow in the XML calculator macro expansion. This issue has…
more
been patched in version 2.3.1.2.
- CWE(s)
Related Threats
MITRE ATT&CK Enterprise Techniques
CVEs Like This One
Affected Assets
Mitigating Controls
Control response
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- 6 hardening rules · 3 OS baselines
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Mitigating Controls (NIST 800-53 r5) AI
Developer testing and evaluation can discover missing input validation through analysis or test cases.
SC-5 directly limits the effects of resource-exhaustion events that constitute uncontrolled consumption.
SC-6 enforces explicit allocation limits on resources, structurally preventing the weakness from occurring.
SI-10 directly requires validity checks on information inputs, structurally preventing improper or missing validation.
Requiring documented development standards and tools can embed input-validation practices into the engineering process.
Engineering principles can mandate structured programming and forbid excessive unconditional branching.
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.
Explicitly requires monitoring and maintaining resource capacity, directly addressing uncontrolled consumption to preserve availability.
Secure SDLC practices directly require and enforce input validation during development.
Continuous monitoring of computing resources can detect resource exhaustion but does not itself enforce allocation limits.
Vulnerability identification processes can discover and record uncontrolled recursion flaws before deployment.
Resilience mechanisms such as avoiding single points of failure indirectly reduce impact of resource exhaustion.
Hardened configuration baselines can include resource quotas and limits that constrain consumption.
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.
Resource-utilization monitoring and alerting on bottlenecks or overloads limits the impact of denial-of-service or resource-exhaustion attacks.
Testing against a defined set of requirements and using code review plus vulnerability scanning forces validation of inputs and handling of unanticipated conditions, reducing the chance that malformed data will be accepted.
By continuously monitoring utilization, stress-testing peak loads, and maintaining documented plans to scale or throttle resources, the control directly limits an attacker’s ability to drive a system into uncontrolled resource exhaustion.
Pre-agreed severity-based prioritization and resource allocation during incident triage reduce the likelihood that an attacker-induced resource exhaustion will overwhelm the organization before corrective action is taken.
Business-continuity plans that include resource-management controls reduce the likelihood that an attacker can trigger uncontrolled resource consumption by forcing the system into a degraded or fallback state.
Defining RTOs and capacity requirements for ICT services during business-impact analysis forces organizations to provision sufficient resources and throttling mechanisms, reducing the likelihood that an attacker can induce denial-of-service through uncontrolled resource consumption.
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).
RHEL 8 (1 rule)
- V-230265 RHEL 8 must prevent the installation of software, patches, service packs, device drivers, or operating system components of local packages without verification they have been digitally signed using a certificate that is issued by a Certificate Authority (CA) that is recognized and approved by the organization. prevents CWE-20