CVE-2025-43591: Heap-based Buffer Overflow Vulnerability in InDesign Desktop

Overview

The Common Vulnerabilities and Exposures (CVE) system has reported a critical vulnerability, CVE-2025-43591, that poses a considerable threat to users of InDesign Desktop versions 19.5.3 and earlier. A heap-based buffer overflow vulnerability has been identified, which could potentially be exploited by threat actors to execute arbitrary code. This flaw is significant as it could enable an attacker to compromise the affected systems or lead to data leakage.

Vulnerability Summary

CVE ID: CVE-2025-43591
Severity: High (7.8 CVSS Score)
Attack Vector: Local
Privileges Required: None
User Interaction: Required
Impact: System compromise, potential data leakage

Affected Products

Product | Affected Versions

InDesign Desktop | 19.5.3 and earlier

How the Exploit Works

The vulnerability resides in how InDesign Desktop handles memory allocation for certain files. In particular, a heap-based buffer overflow issue occurs when the application tries to read a specially crafted file containing more data than the application’s buffer is designed to handle. This causes an overflow in the heap memory, overwriting the adjacent memory locations. An attacker can manipulate this scenario to inject malicious code which can then be executed within the context of the current user.

Conceptual Example Code

Here is a
conceptual
example of how this vulnerability might be exploited. An attacker can create a malicious InDesign file (.indd) with an excess amount of data that overflows the application’s heap memory.

# Attacker crafts a malicious InDesign file
$ echo -e "\x90"*500000 > overflow.indd
# Attacker injects malicious code into the file
$ echo -e "\x31\xc0\x50\x68\x2f\x2f\x73\x68\x68\x2f\x62\x69\x6e\x89\xe3\x50\x53\x89\xe1\xb0\x0b\xcd\x80" >> overflow.indd

This is a simplified example. In a real-world scenario, an attacker would need to overcome various security measures (e.g., ASLR, NX, etc.) to successfully exploit this vulnerability.

Mitigation Guidance

Users of affected InDesign Desktop versions are strongly recommended to apply patches provided by the vendor as soon as possible. As a temporary mitigation, Web Application Firewalls (WAF) or Intrusion Detection Systems (IDS) can be employed to detect and prevent potential exploitation attempts of this vulnerability. Regularly updating and patching software is one of the most effective ways to protect systems from such vulnerabilities.