Vulnerability · Published Nov 2, 2026 · Assigned by VulnCheck
CVE-2026-120454The Sleuth Kit through 4.15.0 NULL Pointer Dereference via decmpfs LZVN Decompression
Medium 5.5
In plain English
A medium-severity null pointer dereference in The Sleuth Kit from The Sleuth Kit. Proof-of-concept exploit code is public. The chance it is exploited in the next 30 days is estimated at 0.1% (higher than 2% of all known vulnerabilities).
Official description
The Sleuth Kit through 4.15.0 contains a NULL pointer dereference vulnerability in decmpfs_decompress_lzvn_attr() that allows attackers to crash the tool by supplying a crafted HFS+ image. Attackers can set a huge uncompressed_size in an LZVN inline com.apple.decmpfs attribute so allocation fails and the decoder writes through NULL, causing denial of service.
Affected packages & fixed versions
| Ecosystem | Package | Fixed in | Advisory |
|---|---|---|---|
| Ubuntu:22.04:LTS | sleuthkit | no fix listed | UBUNTU-CVE-2026-120454 |
| Ubuntu:24.04:LTS | sleuthkit | no fix listed | UBUNTU-CVE-2026-120454 |
| Ubuntu:26.04:LTS | sleuthkit | no fix listed | UBUNTU-CVE-2026-120454 |
| Ubuntu:26.10 | sleuthkit | no fix listed | UBUNTU-CVE-2026-120454 |
Affected products (as reported)
| Vendor | Product | Versions |
|---|---|---|
| The Sleuth Kit | The Sleuth Kit | 0 – through 4.15.0 |
Weakness: CWE-476 · Vector: CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:L/PR:N/UI:R/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:H
References
- https://github.com/sleuthkit/sleuthkit/issues/3583 issue-tracking
- https://github.com/sleuthkit/sleuthkit/blob/sleuthkit-4.15.0/tsk/fs/decmpfs.c#L1154-L1169 technical-description
- The Sleuth Kit sleuthkit-4.15.0 Release Notes release-notes
- https://hackmd.io/@haindpwn/sleuthkit-hfs-decmpfs-attr-oob-read technical-description
- VulnCheck Advisory: The Sleuth Kit through 4.15.0 NULL Pointer Dereference via decmpfs LZVN Decompression third-party-advisory
- https://hackmd.io/@haindpwn/cve-2026-120453-120454-sleuthkit-hfs-decmpfs-attr-oob-read exploit