CVE-2016-1736

Vulnerability

A memory corruption vulnerability exists in the Bluetooth subsystem of Apple OS X versions prior to 10.11.4. The issue can be triggered by a crafted application, leading to arbitrary code execution in a privileged context or denial of service. Affected versions: OS X El Capitan v10.11 to v10.11.3, and possibly earlier versions as per the security update [1].

Exploitation

An attacker must trick a user into running a malicious application on the affected system. No additional authentication or network access is required beyond local execution. The crafted app exploits the memory corruption in the Bluetooth stack to achieve code execution [1].

Impact

Successful exploitation allows the attacker to execute arbitrary code with kernel privileges, gaining full control over the system. Alternatively, the vulnerability can be used to cause a denial of service through memory corruption [1].

Mitigation

Apple addressed this issue in OS X El Capitan v10.11.4 and Security Update 2016-002, released on March 21, 2016 [1]. Users should update to the latest version. No workarounds are documented.