wasm2c in WebAssembly wabt through 1.0.41 allows sandbox escape in some situations that primarily involve 32-bit platforms, aka a "table flip" attack. It does not check the return value of calloc() in wasm_rt_allocate_funcref_table() (wasm2c/wasm-rt-impl-tableops.inc). When the funcref table allocation fails, table->data is left NULL while table->size keeps the guest-declared element count; thus, bounds checks still pass and table element accesses resolve to absolute memory addresses (i * sizeof(wasm_rt_funcref_t)). This gives arbitrary read and write of host process memory and - via table.get, table.set, and call_indirect - arbitrary code execution, defeating the isolation that wasm2c exists to provide (a full sandbox escape). wasm2c is used as an in-process sandboxing boundary by RLBox and WasmBoxC, including in Firefox, which compiles the Graphite, Hunspell, Ogg, Expat, and Woff2 libraries via wasm2c to contain untrusted font, media, and XML input. Therefore, sandboxing in these applications is potentially affected. Exploitation requires the funcref table allocation to fail, for example under an address-space limit (RLIMIT_AS), on 32-bit hosts, with vm.overcommit_memory=2, or under memory pressure. On 64-bit Linux with default overcommit the allocation succeeds and the defect is not triggered. The wasm2c memory allocator aborts on calloc failure in the same runtime; the table allocator lacks this abort behavior. This was introduced in commit ab9e0b55 (PR #813).

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Sat, 12 Sep 2026 23:30:00 +0000

Type Values Removed Values Added
Description wasm2c in WebAssembly wabt through 1.0.41 allows sandbox escape in some situations that primarily involve 32-bit platforms, aka a "table flip" attack. It does not check the return value of calloc() in wasm_rt_allocate_funcref_table() (wasm2c/wasm-rt-impl-tableops.inc). When the funcref table allocation fails, table->data is left NULL while table->size keeps the guest-declared element count; thus, bounds checks still pass and table element accesses resolve to absolute memory addresses (i * sizeof(wasm_rt_funcref_t)). This gives arbitrary read and write of host process memory and - via table.get, table.set, and call_indirect - arbitrary code execution, defeating the isolation that wasm2c exists to provide (a full sandbox escape). wasm2c is used as an in-process sandboxing boundary by RLBox and WasmBoxC, including in Firefox, which compiles the Graphite, Hunspell, Ogg, Expat, and Woff2 libraries via wasm2c to contain untrusted font, media, and XML input. Therefore, sandboxing in these applications is potentially affected. Exploitation requires the funcref table allocation to fail, for example under an address-space limit (RLIMIT_AS), on 32-bit hosts, with vm.overcommit_memory=2, or under memory pressure. On 64-bit Linux with default overcommit the allocation succeeds and the defect is not triggered. The wasm2c memory allocator aborts on calloc failure in the same runtime; the table allocator lacks this abort behavior. This was introduced in commit ab9e0b55 (PR #813).
First Time appeared Webassembly
Webassembly wabt
Weaknesses CWE-252
CPEs cpe:2.3:a:webassembly:wabt:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*
Vendors & Products Webassembly
Webassembly wabt
References
Metrics cvssV4_0

{'score': 7.1, 'vector': 'CVSS:4.0/AV:L/AC:L/AT:P/PR:N/UI:N/VC:N/VI:H/VA:H/SC:N/SI:H/SA:H'}


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cve-icon MITRE

Status: PUBLISHED

Assigner: mitre

Published:

Updated: 2026-09-12T23:16:34.123Z

Reserved: 2026-09-12T23:16:33.768Z

Link: CVE-2026-90648

cve-icon Vulnrichment

No data.

cve-icon NVD

Status : Received

Published: 2026-09-13T00:17:07.023

Modified: 2026-09-13T00:17:07.023

Link: CVE-2026-90648

cve-icon Redhat

No data.

cve-icon OpenCVE Enrichment

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Weaknesses