CVE-2026-28688 ImageMagick has a heap use-after-free in the MSL encoder

What is CVE-2026-28688?

CVE-2026-28688 is a medium-severity use after free vulnerability in Imagemagick Imagemagick, published on 9 Mar 2026. It can only be exploited from the same machine or local network, with no action from the victim.

Official description

ImageMagick is free and open-source software used for editing and manipulating digital images. Prior to versions 7.1.2-16 and 6.9.13-41, a heap-use-after-free vulnerability exists in the MSL encoder, where a cloned image is destroyed twice. The MSL coder does not support writing MSL so the write capability has been removed. This vulnerability is fixed in 7.1.2-16 and 6.9.13-41.

Weakness: CWE-416

Which versions are affected by CVE-2026-28688?

38 open source packages ship an affected version, including Magick.NET-Q16-AnyCPU, Magick.NET-Q16-HDRI-AnyCPU and Magick.NET-Q16-HDRI-OpenMP-arm64. It affects 1 product.

Products include Imagemagick Imagemagick.

How do I fix CVE-2026-28688?

Upgrade Magick.NET-Q16-AnyCPU to 14.10.4 or later.

Upgrade to the fixed version. These bugs are found with fuzzing and sanitisers and avoided by memory-safe languages. More about Use after free.

Is CVE-2026-28688 being exploited?

There is no known exploitation of CVE-2026-28688 in the wild and no public exploit code.

Other vulnerabilities in Imagemagick Imagemagick

• CVE-2019-19952 Use after free in n/a Critical 9.8
• CVE-2018-16328 Null dereference in n/a Critical 9.8
• CVE-2018-16329 Null dereference in n/a Critical 9.8
• CVE-2017-18210 Null dereference in n/a Critical 9.8
• CVE-2017-14138 Denial of service in n/a Critical 9.8

All Imagemagick Imagemagick vulnerabilities

Sources

• CVE record
• NVD
• OSV
• GitHub advisory
• How this page is made

Also known as DEBIAN-CVE-2026-28688, ECHO-7719-678e-b834, GHSA-xxw5-m53x-j38c, JLSEC-2026-976, MINI-h76x-xjm8-3652, UBUNTU-CVE-2026-28688.