Description

Substance3D - Designer is affected by a Heap-based Buffer Overflow vulnerability that could result in arbitrary code execution in the context of the current user. Exploitation of this issue requires user interaction in that a victim must open a malicious file.

Executive Summary

Technical Details

Mitigations

References

Additional Metadata

{
  "score": "7.8",
  "pubDate": "2026-08-25T18:17:55.097Z",
  "pubdate": "2026-08-25T18:17:55.097Z",
  "executiveSummary": "Substance3D Designer is susceptible to a heap-based buffer overflow vulnerability that enables arbitrary code execution.\nThe vulnerability originates from improper memory management within the application, allowing an attacker to corrupt the heap structure when processing specially crafted files.\nSuccessful exploitation results in arbitrary code execution within the security context of the currently logged-in user, which may lead to full system compromise depending on the user's privilege level.\nThe attack vector is local, requiring the victim to be enticed into opening a malicious file supplied by an adversary.\nThis represents a high-severity risk to system integrity and confidentiality, as it bypasses standard application-layer security controls through memory corruption.\nThe exploitability of this issue is contingent upon user interaction, categorized as a client-side execution vulnerability.",
  "technicalDetails": "The vulnerability is classified as a heap-based buffer overflow, occurring when the application fails to perform adequate bounds checking during the parsing or deserialization of malicious Substance3D Designer files.\nWhen a user opens a manipulated file, the vulnerable component allocates memory on the heap to store data parsed from the file structure. Due to the absence of sufficient length validation or inadequate size calculation, an attacker can provide crafted input that exceeds the allocated buffer capacity.\nThis overflow allows an attacker to overwrite adjacent data structures on the heap, such as object pointers, function pointers, or heap management metadata (e.g., chunk headers). By carefully controlling the overflow content, the attacker can redirect the program's execution flow when the application subsequently attempts to reference or invoke the corrupted structures.\nThe attack flow proceeds as follows: 1) The attacker creates a malformed file containing an oversized data payload designed to trigger the overflow. 2) The attacker social-engineers the target into opening this file within Substance3D Designer. 3) The parsing engine reads the malicious payload, triggers the buffer overflow, and overwrites target memory locations. 4) The application reaches an execution state that relies on the corrupted heap data, causing the execution pointer to redirect to attacker-controlled shellcode or a ROP (Return-Oriented Programming) chain.\nThe resulting impact is arbitrary code execution, granting the attacker the same permissions as the user executing the software. This allows for unauthorized data access, the installation of persistent backdoors, or lateral movement within the compromised system. The vulnerability does not require authentication to the software itself, but does require the target to interact with the malicious file. Exploitation is typically platform-dependent, relying on the memory layout of the application process at the time of execution."
}