CVE-2026-23952
Published: 22 January 2026
Summary
CVE-2026-23952 is a medium-severity NULL Pointer Dereference (CWE-476) vulnerability in Imagemagick Imagemagick. Its CVSS base score is 6.5 (Medium).
Operationally, exploitation aligns with the MITRE ATT&CK technique Application or System Exploitation (T1499.004); ranked at the 7.2th 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 are NIST 800-53 SI-10 (Information Input Validation) and SI-2 (Flaw Remediation).
Deeper analysis
CVE-2026-23952 is a NULL pointer dereference vulnerability in the MSL (Magick Scripting Language) parser of ImageMagick, affecting versions 14.10.1 and earlier. The flaw occurs when processing <comment> tags before images are loaded, leading to an assertion failure in debug builds or a NULL pointer dereference in release builds. This issue, classified under CWE-476, carries a CVSS v3.1 base score of 6.5 (AV:N/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:H), indicating medium severity primarily due to high availability impact.
An attacker with low privileges, such as an authenticated user on a system processing untrusted MSL input over the network, can exploit this vulnerability with low complexity and no user interaction required. By crafting a malicious MSL file with a specially positioned <comment> tag, the attacker triggers the parser error, causing the ImageMagick process to crash and resulting in a denial-of-service condition.
The official ImageMagick security advisory (GHSA-5vx3-wx4q-6cj8) details the fix in version 14.10.2, recommending immediate upgrades for affected installations. Additionally, the Magick.NET library, which wraps ImageMagick, released version 14.10.2 to address this vulnerability. Practitioners should verify and apply these patches, disable MSL processing if unnecessary, and validate inputs in environments handling user-supplied image files.
EU & UK References
- 🇪🇺 ENISA EUVD: EUVD-2026-3699
Vulnerability details
ImageMagick is free and open-source software used for editing and manipulating digital images. Versions 14.10.1 and below have a NULL pointer dereference vulnerability in the MSL (Magick Scripting Language) parser when processing <comment> tags before images are loaded. This can…
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lead to DoS attack due to assertion failure (debug builds) or NULL pointer dereference (release builds). This issue is fixed in version 14.10.2.
- CWE(s)
Related Threats
MITRE ATT&CK Enterprise TechniquesAI
Why these techniques?
NULL pointer dereference in MSL parser directly enables application exploitation to crash the ImageMagick process, matching T1499.004 Endpoint Denial of Service via software vulnerability.
CVEs Like This One
Affected Assets
Mitigating Controls
Mitigating Controls (NIST 800-53 r5) AI
Directly requires validation of MSL input containing <comment> tags to prevent the NULL dereference before the parser crashes the process.
Mandates timely application of the ImageMagick 14.10.2 patch that eliminates the MSL parser flaw.
Allows disabling MSL processing entirely when not required, removing the attack surface described in the CVE.