CVE-2025-24118: 
macOS vulnerability analysis and mitigation

CVE-2025-24118 is a critical kernel vulnerability discovered in Apple's operating systems that was patched in January 2025. The vulnerability affects multiple Apple products including macOS Sonoma (versions below 14.7.3), macOS Sequoia (versions below 15.3), and iPadOS (versions below 17.7.4). The issue was discovered by security researcher Joseph Ravichandran (@0xjprx) of MIT CSAIL and was addressed by Apple with improved memory handling (Apple Support, GBHackers).

The vulnerability arises from a race condition within Apple's XNU kernel, specifically targeting a process's credentials stored in a read-only structure. The flaw involves the interaction of several kernel features including Safe Memory Reclamation (SMR), per-thread credentials, and read-only page mappings. The vulnerability occurs during updates to the pucred field, where the unsafe use of non-atomic function zallocro_mut during credential pointer updates bypasses atomicity requirements, introducing a race condition. The issue received a CVSS score of 9.8 (Critical) (GBHackers).

If exploited, the vulnerability could allow an unprivileged local attacker to cause unexpected system termination, corrupt kernel memory, or potentially achieve kernel-level code execution. This makes it particularly concerning for systems in enterprise environments or shared systems where privilege escalation could lead to significant security breaches (GBHackers).

Apple has addressed the vulnerability in macOS Sonoma 14.7.3, macOS Sequoia 15.3, and iPadOS 17.7.4 released on January 27, 2025. The fix involves replacing non-atomic writes with atomic operations for the p_ucred field to ensure proper synchronization. Users are strongly advised to update their systems to the latest versions immediately and avoid running unverified binaries or granting excessive permissions to untrusted applications (Apple Support, GBHackers).