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High

Out-of-bounds memory access in Chrome WebAssembly AsmJS handling

IdentifiersCVE-2026-3542CWE-787

CVE-2026-3542 is a high-severity vulnerability in Google Chrome prior to 145.0.7632.159 affecting WebAssembly handling in V8’s AsmJS-to-WebAssembly pipeline. According to the provided content, the issue stems from flawed state management in the AsmJsParser while processing heap access expressions. Specifically, parser state used to track heap-access shift metadata is stored in shared instance fields and can be overwritten during recursive parsing of nested shift expressions. When the parser later truncates and rewrites the generated WebAssembly opcode stream based on this stale state, it can corrupt the emitted bytecode stream and misalign opcodes and immediates. Because AsmJS-generated WebAssembly is treated as trusted by V8, normal decoder validation paths may be bypassed, allowing malformed but accepted WebAssembly to reach instantiation. This can lead to out-of-bounds memory access from a crafted HTML page.

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ANALYST BRIEF

Impact, mitigation & remediation

What it means. What to do now. Patch path, mitigations, and the assume-compromise checklist.

Impact

What an attacker gets, and what they’ve been doing with it.

Successful exploitation allows a remote attacker to trigger out-of-bounds memory access in the browser renderer via crafted web content. The supplied content further indicates that the malformed trusted WebAssembly stream can be leveraged to obtain arbitrary read/write primitives and potentially achieve arbitrary code execution. More generally, the impact includes possible renderer compromise, information disclosure, process crash, and full browser exploitation depending on exploit reliability and sandbox escape chaining.

Mitigation

If you can’t patch tonight, do this now.

Until patching is complete, reduce exposure by limiting use of untrusted web content, isolating high-risk browsing activity, and enforcing rapid browser update policies. In enterprise environments, prioritize rollout of the fixed Chrome build through centralized management. Because exploitation is delivered via crafted HTML content, restricting access to untrusted sites and disabling or tightly controlling active web content in sensitive environments may reduce risk, but patching is the primary mitigation.

Remediation

Patch, then assume compromise.

Upgrade Google Chrome and Chromium-based deployments to version 145.0.7632.159 or later on Linux, and 145.0.7632.159/160 or later on Windows and macOS, as referenced in the provided content. Apply the vendor patch that corrects the WebAssembly/AsmJS implementation flaw in V8. Enterprise administrators should deploy the fixed browser version across managed endpoints as soon as possible.
PUBLIC EXPLOITS

Exploits

No public exploits tracked yet. Mallory keeps watching.

VALID 0 / 0 TOTALView more in app

No public exploit code observed for this vulnerability.

EXPOSURE SURFACE

Affected products & vendors

Products and vendors Mallory has correlated with this vulnerability. Open in Mallory to drill down to specific CPE configurations and version ranges.

VendorProductType
GoogleChromeapplication

Vendor-confirmed product mapping. Mallory continuously reconciles this list against your asset inventory.

ACTIVITY FEED

Recent activity

8 sources tracked across advisories, community write-ups, and news. New activity surfaces here as Mallory finds it.

8 SOURCESView more in app
What this page doesn’t show

The version that knows your environment.

This page is what’s public. Mallory adds the parts that aren’t: which of your assets are affected, which adversaries are exploiting it right now, which detections to deploy, and what to do tonight.
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Exposure mapping

Query your assets running an affected version, and investigate the blast radius.

Threat actor evidence

Every observed campaign linking this CVE to a named adversary.

Associated malware

Malware families riding this exploit, with evidence and IOCs.

Detection signatures1

YARA, Sigma, Snort, and vendor rules, auto-deployed to your SIEM.

Vendor-by-vendor mapping

Cross-references every affected SKU, including bundled OEM variants.

Social activity4

Community discussion across Reddit, Mastodon, and other social sources.

EXTERNAL REFERENCES
MITRE CVE
cve.org · CVE-2026-3542
NVD
nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2026-3542
MITRE CWE · CWE-787
cwe.mitre.org
Vendor Advisory
chromereleases.googleblog.com/2026/03/stable-channel-update-for-desktop.html
Issue Tracking
issues.chromium.org/issues/485152421