CVE-2026-116160: 
ImageMagick vulnerability analysis and mitigation

CVE-2026-116160 is a heap-based buffer overflow vulnerability in ImageMagick's X11 animate operation that can cause application crashes when processing specially crafted images. It affects ImageMagick versions before 6.9.13-58 and 7.x versions before 7.1.2-33. The vulnerability was published on October 25, 2026, with the original security advisory (GHSA-6p6q-wfrv-ffhh) credited to reporter VikzSharma. It carries a CVSS v3.1 base score of 3.3 (Low) and a CVSS v4.0 base score of 4.8 (Medium) (Red Hat Advisory, GitHub Advisory, ImageMagick Advisory).

The vulnerability is classified as CWE-787 (Out-of-bounds Write) and CWE-122 (Heap-based Buffer Overflow), arising from insufficient bounds checking in ImageMagick's X11 animate code path when parsing image data. An attacker crafts a malicious image file that, when processed via the animate command with an X11 display, triggers a write beyond the bounds of a heap-allocated buffer, corrupting adjacent memory. Exploitation requires local access and user interaction — specifically, a victim must manually invoke the X11 animate operation on the malicious image. No public proof-of-concept code has been identified (ImageMagick Advisory, Red Hat Bugzilla).

Successful exploitation results in a Denial of Service (DoS) through application crash due to heap memory corruption. There is no impact on confidentiality or integrity — the vulnerability is limited to availability of the ImageMagick process. Lateral movement and data exfiltration are not associated with this vulnerability given its constrained impact scope (Red Hat Advisory, GitHub Advisory).

There is no known public proof-of-concept exploit and no evidence of in-the-wild exploitation as of the disclosure date. The EPSS score is 0.0, reflecting a very low probability of exploitation in the near term. The vulnerability is not listed in the CISA Known Exploited Vulnerabilities (KEV) catalog. Exploitation requires user interaction (a victim must run the X11 animate operation on a crafted image), which significantly limits the attack surface (Red Hat Advisory, GitHub Advisory).

1. Craft a malicious image: Create a specially crafted image file (e.g., a malformed GIF, PNG, or other format supported by ImageMagick) designed to trigger an out-of-bounds heap write during X11 animate parsing.
2. Deliver the image to the target: Use social engineering, a shared file system, email attachment, or a web download to deliver the malicious image to a user on a system running a vulnerable version of ImageMagick with X11 support.
3. Induce the victim to run the animate operation: Trick the user into executing animate <malicious_image> on a system with an active X11 display, or embed the operation in a script or workflow the user is likely to run.
4. Trigger the crash: ImageMagick processes the crafted image, the heap buffer overflow occurs, heap memory is corrupted, and the application crashes — achieving a Denial of Service (ImageMagick Advisory, Red Hat Bugzilla).

• Logs: Unexpected application crash logs or core dump files generated by the ImageMagick animate process; system logs (e.g., /var/log/syslog) showing segmentation faults or abort signals from the animate binary.
• File System: Presence of suspicious or unexpected image files (e.g., unusually small or malformed GIF/PNG files) in directories accessible to users; core dump files (e.g., core.*) in the working directory of the animate process.
• Process: Abnormal termination of the animate process with a non-zero exit code; repeated crash-restart cycles if animate is invoked from an automated script.

Update ImageMagick to version 6.9.13-58 or later (for the 6.x branch) or 7.1.2-33 or later (for the 7.x branch) to remediate the vulnerability. As a workaround, restrict users from processing untrusted image files with the X11 animate feature, and educate users to avoid opening image files from unknown or untrusted sources. Organizations that do not use the X11 animate functionality can consider disabling or removing X11 support from their ImageMagick build (ImageMagick Advisory, Red Hat Advisory).

The vulnerability was reported by security researcher VikzSharma and disclosed via the ImageMagick GitHub security advisory program. Red Hat tracked the issue via Bugzilla (Bug 2560409) and published a corresponding CVE advisory. No significant broader media coverage or notable community commentary has been identified beyond standard vulnerability database entries (ImageMagick Advisory, Red Hat Bugzilla).