CVE-2026-118016
Description
A flaw was found in Firefox and Thunderbird. The Mozilla Foundation's Security Advisory describes the following issue: Use-after-free in the DOM: Core & HTML component
Statement
Red Hat Product Security rates the severity of this flaw as determined by the Mozilla Foundation Security Advisory.
Mitigation
--- CME Mitigation Guidance (2026-11-03) ---
Disclaimer: The following mitigation solutions are provided as a courtesy, pending the application of an official patch. This content was generated utilizing AI tools in conjunction with data from https://cmetaxonomy.org. Customers are advised to independently evaluate and test these temporary mitigations within their own infrastructure.
The highest-value action is to prevent dereferencing freed memory during DOM object lifecycle management in the DOM: Core & HTML component: upgrade to Firefox 159 and Thunderbird 159, which corrects DOM object lifecycle management in the DOM: Core & HTML component to prevent use-after-free memory corruption, closing malicious web page manipulating DOM elements. Until patched, this is a concern on Any platform rendering untrusted web pages or opening untrusted content in browser-like contexts, so restrict user access to untrusted web content and avoid opening untrusted web pages or links in browser-like contexts. As a compensating measure, Enable ASLR to randomize the browser process memory space and impede reliable pointer redirection, Ensure the browser binary is built with Full RELRO and PIE to make the Global Offset Table read-only and prevent GOT overwrites, and Enforce SELinux to confine the browser process to least-privilege security domains and limit host system compromise. These controls limit blast radius and contain exploitation, but they do not fix the underlying use-after-free defect — apply the upstream patch to fully remediate.
Highest-impact CME: CME-301 SELinux (Enforcing Mode) (medium)
Common Vulnerability Scoring System (CVSS) Score Details
Info alert:Important note
CVSS scores for open source components depend on vendor-specific factors (e.g. version or build chain). Therefore, Red Hat's score and impact rating can be different from NVD and other vendors. Red Hat remains the authoritative CVE Naming Authority (CNA) source for its products and services (see Red Hat classifications).
The following CVSS metrics and score provided are preliminary and subject to review.
CVSS v3 Score Breakdown
| Red Hat | NVD | cve.org | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Base Score | 7.5 | N/A | 8.8 |
| Attack Vector | Network | N/A | Network |
| Attack Complexity | High | N/A | Low |
| Privileges Required | None | N/A | None |
| User Interaction | Required | N/A | Required |
| Scope | Unchanged | N/A | Unchanged |
| Confidentiality | High | N/A | High |
| Integrity Impact | High | N/A | High |
| Availability Impact | High | N/A | High |
Vector
Red Hat: CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:H/PR:N/UI:R/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:H
cve.org: CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:R/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:H
Understanding the Weakness (CWE)
Confidentiality
Technical Impact: Read Memory
If the expired pointer is used in a read operation, an attacker might be able to control data read in by the application.
Availability
Technical Impact: DoS: Crash, Exit, or Restart
If the expired pointer references a memory location that is not accessible to the product, or points to a location that is "malformed" (such as NULL) or larger than expected by a read or write operation, then a crash may occur.
Integrity,Confidentiality,Availability
Technical Impact: Execute Unauthorized Code or Commands
If the expired pointer is used in a function call, or points to unexpected data in a write operation, then code execution may be possible.
Frequently Asked Questions
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