Description

In Audio HAL, there is a possible escalation of privilege due to use after free. This could lead to local escalation of privilege if a malicious actor has already obtained the System privilege. User interaction is not needed for exploitation. Patch ID: ALPS11191981; Issue ID: MSV-9126.

Executive Summary

Technical Details

Mitigations

References

Additional Metadata

{
  "score": "6.7",
  "pubDate": "2026-09-07T02:17:19.250Z",
  "pubdate": "2026-09-07T02:17:19.250Z",
  "executiveSummary": "A critical use-after-free (UAF) vulnerability has been identified within the Audio Hardware Abstraction Layer (HAL).\nThis flaw permits a local escalation of privilege, allowing an attacker who has already compromised the system-level process to potentially execute arbitrary code with elevated permissions.\nThe vulnerability resides in the memory management logic of the Audio HAL, where incorrect object lifecycle handling leads to a reference to deallocated memory.\nExploitation does not require user interaction, though it assumes the attacker has successfully gained access to the system context prior to triggering the memory corruption.\nThe vulnerability is tracked under Issue ID: MSV-9126 and addressed via Patch ID: ALPS11191981.\nGiven the nature of HAL-level vulnerabilities, successful exploitation could lead to total compromise of the affected hardware abstraction interface, potentially impacting system stability and security integrity.",
  "technicalDetails": "The vulnerability stems from a use-after-free (UAF) condition within the Audio HAL component. A use-after-free occurs when an application continues to use a pointer after the memory area it references has been explicitly freed or returned to the memory allocator.\nIn the context of the Audio HAL, the vulnerability arises when an object representing an audio stream or device session is released prematurely while other threads or asynchronous callbacks still maintain active references to that object's memory address.\nThe root cause is an imbalance in the reference counting mechanism or improper synchronization between the thread responsible for decommissioning audio resources and the threads responsible for processing audio data packets.\nThe attack flow begins with the malicious actor, already operating at the System privilege level, manipulating the state of the audio driver interface to trigger the specific sequence of operations that lead to the premature freeing of the object. Once the object is deallocated, the attacker must attempt to perform heap spraying or memory grooming to occupy the newly freed memory region with attacker-controlled data.\nWhen the Audio HAL subsequently attempts to access the stale pointer, it operates on the controlled data, which can lead to redirection of execution flow. If the pointer is used for a function call, the attacker can hijack the program counter to point to a payload (e.g., Return-Oriented Programming (ROP) gadgets or shellcode) injected into the heap.\nBecause the Audio HAL operates within a privileged execution environment, successful exploitation allows the attacker to break out of restricted contexts or gain further control over the underlying system hardware. The lack of requirement for user interaction makes this an attractive vector for persistent threats that have already achieved initial foothold within the system.\nThe vulnerability is limited to local exploitation, meaning the attacker must be capable of executing code on the device. However, because the vulnerability exists at the abstraction layer, it bypasses standard user-space process protections by targeting the interface between the application framework and the kernel-mode drivers."
}