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Mallory
High

Use-after-free in Google Chrome Proxy via crafted PAC script

IdentifiersCVE-2026-9887CWE-416· Use After Free

CVE-2026-9887 is a critical use-after-free vulnerability in the Proxy component of Google Chrome affecting versions prior to 148.0.7778.216. According to the provided content, the flaw can be triggered by a remote attacker via a crafted PAC (Proxy Auto-Configuration) script. The vulnerability arises from improper lifetime management of memory in the Proxy component, leading to a stale pointer dereference after the underlying object has been freed. Successful exploitation may allow arbitrary code execution in the context of the browser process handling the vulnerable component.

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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 can allow a remote attacker to execute arbitrary code on the target system. Depending on runtime conditions and Chrome's process architecture, this may result in compromise of the affected browser context and could potentially be leveraged for further actions such as data access, persistence within the user context, or chaining with additional vulnerabilities.

Mitigation

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

No specific workaround or temporary mitigation is provided in the supplied advisories. If immediate patching is not possible, reducing exposure to untrusted PAC scripts and limiting use of externally supplied proxy auto-configuration may reduce attack surface, but the authoritative remediation in the provided content is to upgrade to a fixed version.

Remediation

Patch, then assume compromise.

Upgrade Google Chrome to version 148.0.7778.216 or later. For Debian chromium, upgrade to 148.0.7778.215-1~deb12u1 on oldstable (bookworm) or 148.0.7778.215-1~deb13u1 on stable (trixie), as provided in the advisory content.
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

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ACTIVITY FEED

Recent activity

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

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.
Exposure mapping

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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 signatures

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 activity

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