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OpenAdvisories
Medium · 6.5 CVE-2026-32814 EUVD-2026-30980

libheif: Uninitialized Heap Memory Information Leak via Failed Grid Tiles

Published May 19, 2026 · Updated May 20, 2026 · Assigned by GitHub_M

Description

libheif is a HEIF and AVIF file format decoder and encoder. In versions 1.21.2 and prior, when decoding a HEIF grid image with strict_decoding=false (the default), a corrupted tile silently fails to decode and the library returns heif_error_Ok with no indication of failure, leading to an uninitialized heap memory information leak. The canvas is allocated via create_clone_image_at_new_size() → plane.alloc() → new (std::nothrow) uint8_t[allocation_size] which does not zero the memory; only the alpha plane is explicitly initialized via fill_plane(), so the Y, Cb, and Cr planes contain whatever was previously at that heap address. The failed tile's region of the canvas is never written. It retains uninitialized heap data that is delivered to the caller as decoded pixel values (4,096 bytes per Y/Cb/Cr plane = 12,288+ bytes total). Any application using libheif to decode grid-based HEIF/AVIF files with default settings is vulnerable: a crafted .heic or .avif file causes 4,096+ bytes of heap memory to appear as pixel values in the decoded image, and the calling application receives heif_error_Ok, so it has no indication the output contains heap garbage. In server-side image processing, an uploaded crafted HEIF decoded and re-encoded (e.g., as PNG/JPEG for thumbnails, CDN, social media) can leak cross-user data such as auth tokens, database results, and other users' image data. This issue has been fixed in version 1.22.0.

Affected products

VendorProductAffectedFixed
strukturag libheif < 1.22.0 —

Fixed in Linux distributions

Distributions backport fixes, so the version that fixes this vulnerability differs per release — upgrade to at least the version shown. From the distributions' security trackers and advisories.

ReleasePackageFixed inAdvisory
Debian 14 libheif 1.23.1-1 —
Debian 12 libheif No fix yet —
ReleasePackageFixed inAdvisory
Ubuntu 26.04 LTS libheif 1.21.2-3ubuntu0.1 —
Ubuntu 25.10 libheif 1.20.2-1ubuntu0.4 —
Ubuntu 24.04 LTS libheif 1.17.6-1ubuntu4.4 —
Show 2 more (older releases, extended support, other products)
ReleasePackageFixed inAdvisory
Ubuntu Pro 22.04 LTS libheif 1.12.0-2ubuntu0.1~esm3 —
Ubuntu Pro 20.04 LTS libheif 1.6.1-1ubuntu0.1~esm3 —
ReleasePackageFixed inAdvisory
SLES 15 SP7 libheif 1.23.0-150700.3.15.1 SUSE-SU-2026:2622-1
Show 2 more (older releases, extended support, other products)
ReleasePackageFixed inAdvisory
SLES for SAP 16.0 libheif 1.23.0-160000.1.1 SUSE-SU-2026:22153-1
SLES 16.0 libheif 1.23.0-160000.1.1 SUSE-SU-2026:22153-1
ReleasePackageFixed inAdvisory
openSUSE Tumbleweed libheif 1.22.2-1.1 openSUSE-SU-2026:10878-1
openSUSE Leap 16.0 libheif 1.23.0-160000.1.1 openSUSE-SU-2026:20974-1

Advisories 4

References