Adobe InDesign Vulnerability: Arbitrary Code Execution Risk

The National Vulnerability Database (NVD) recently highlighted a significant heap-based buffer overflow vulnerability, identified as CVE-2026-27238, affecting Adobe InDesign Desktop versions 20.5.2, 21.2, and earlier. This isn’t just a minor bug; it’s a critical flaw that could lead to arbitrary code execution.

Rated with a CVSS score of 7.8 (HIGH), this vulnerability carries serious implications. An attacker could leverage this to execute code in the context of the current user, essentially running malicious software on a victim’s machine. The silver lining, if you can call it that, is the requirement for user interaction: a victim must open a specially crafted, malicious file. This isn’t a zero-click exploit, but social engineering can make that ‘user interaction’ a very low bar. The NVD points to CWE-122, a classic heap-based buffer overflow, which often signals memory corruption issues that can be exploited for control flow hijacking.