CVE-2021-28606
📋 TL;DR
Adobe After Effects versions 18.2 and earlier contain a stack-based buffer overflow vulnerability when parsing malicious files. An attacker can exploit this to execute arbitrary code with the victim's privileges, requiring the user to open a specially crafted file. This affects all users running vulnerable versions of Adobe After Effects.
💻 Affected Systems
- Adobe After Effects
📦 What is this software?
⚠️ Risk & Real-World Impact
Worst Case
Complete system compromise via arbitrary code execution with the current user's privileges, potentially leading to data theft, ransomware deployment, or lateral movement within the network.
Likely Case
Malware installation or data exfiltration when a user opens a malicious After Effects project file from an untrusted source.
If Mitigated
Limited impact if users only open files from trusted sources and have endpoint protection that detects malicious file parsing.
🎯 Exploit Status
Exploitation requires user interaction (opening malicious file) but is unauthenticated once the file is opened.
🛠️ Fix & Mitigation
✅ Official Fix
Patch Version: 18.2.1 and later
Vendor Advisory: https://helpx.adobe.com/security/products/after_effects/apsb21-49.html
Restart Required: Yes
Instructions:
1. Open Adobe Creative Cloud application. 2. Navigate to 'Apps' tab. 3. Find Adobe After Effects and click 'Update'. 4. Restart After Effects after update completes.
🔧 Temporary Workarounds
Restrict file opening
allConfigure application control policies to prevent opening After Effects files from untrusted sources.
User awareness training
allTrain users to only open After Effects project files from trusted sources and verify file integrity.
🧯 If You Can't Patch
- Implement application whitelisting to block execution of malicious payloads
- Deploy endpoint detection and response (EDR) to monitor for suspicious process behavior
🔍 How to Verify
Check if Vulnerable:
Check Adobe After Effects version via Help > About After Effects. If version is 18.2 or earlier, system is vulnerable.Check Version:
On Windows: Check registry at HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Adobe\After Effects\18.0\InstallPath. On macOS: Check /Applications/Adobe After Effects 2021/Adobe After Effects 2021.app/Contents/Info.plistVerify Fix Applied:
Verify version is 18.2.1 or later in Help > About After Effects.📡 Detection & Monitoring
Log Indicators:
- Application crashes with memory access violations
- Suspicious child processes spawned from After Effects
Network Indicators:
- Unexpected outbound connections from After Effects process
SIEM Query:
process_name:"AfterFX.exe" AND (event_id:1000 OR event_id:1001) OR process_parent_name:"AfterFX.exe" AND process_name NOT IN (expected_child_processes)