CVE-2024-30274: Adobe Substance 3D Painter RCE Vulnerability

CVE-2024-30274 Overview

CVE-2024-30274 is an out-of-bounds write vulnerability [CWE-787] affecting Adobe Substance 3D Painter versions 9.1.2 and earlier. Successful exploitation allows arbitrary code execution in the context of the current user. The flaw requires local user interaction: a victim must open a malicious file crafted by an attacker.

Adobe published fixes in security bulletin APSB24-31. The vulnerability carries a CVSS 3.1 base score of 7.8. No public proof-of-concept exploit is available, and the flaw is not listed in the CISA Known Exploited Vulnerabilities catalog.

Critical Impact
Opening a malicious project or asset file in Substance 3D Painter can grant an attacker arbitrary code execution with the privileges of the logged-in user.

Affected Products

Adobe Substance 3D Painter 9.1.2
Adobe Substance 3D Painter versions earlier than 9.1.2
Windows and macOS installations of the affected releases

Discovery Timeline

2024-05-16 - CVE-2024-30274 published to NVD
2026-06-17 - Last updated in NVD database

Technical Details for CVE-2024-30274

Vulnerability Analysis

The vulnerability is an out-of-bounds write within Adobe Substance 3D Painter's file parsing logic. When the application processes a malformed file, it writes data past the end of an allocated buffer. This memory corruption can be shaped by an attacker to overwrite adjacent structures, function pointers, or heap metadata.

Controlled memory corruption in a desktop content-creation tool typically leads to arbitrary code execution. The attacker gains execution in the security context of the user running Painter, inheriting access to project files, network shares, and any credentials cached by the session.

Exploitation requires local attack access and user interaction. The attacker delivers a weaponized asset — for example, a project file, texture, or import format — through phishing, a shared asset library, or a compromised marketplace. The vulnerability affects confidentiality, integrity, and availability at a high level once triggered.

Root Cause

The root cause is missing or insufficient bounds validation on data parsed from an untrusted input file. Substance 3D Painter writes to a buffer using attacker-influenced size or offset values without confirming those values remain within allocated memory. This class of defect is tracked as CWE-787: Out-of-bounds Write.

Attack Vector

An attacker crafts a malicious Substance 3D Painter-compatible file and delivers it through email, chat, or a compromised asset repository. When a user opens the file, the parser triggers the out-of-bounds write and executes attacker-supplied code. No network access to the victim workstation is required, and no elevated privileges are needed to launch the attack.

The vulnerability manifests during file parsing in the affected Painter versions. See the Adobe Security Update APSB24-31 for vendor technical details.

Detection Methods for CVE-2024-30274

Indicators of Compromise

Unexpected child processes spawned by the Substance 3D Painter.exe (or macOS equivalent) binary, particularly shells, script interpreters, or rundll32
Substance 3D Painter opening files from unusual locations such as browser download folders, email attachment caches, or removable media
Crash artifacts, Windows Error Reporting entries, or macOS crash logs referencing the Painter process shortly after opening a third-party asset
Outbound network connections initiated by the Painter process to previously unseen hosts

Detection Strategies

Alert on process-creation events where Substance 3D Painter is the parent of scripting or living-off-the-land binaries such as powershell.exe, cmd.exe, wscript.exe, or bash
Monitor for module loads and file writes by Painter into user-writable persistence locations such as %APPDATA%\Microsoft\Windows\Start Menu\Programs\Startup or ~/Library/LaunchAgents
Correlate Painter crashes with subsequent anomalous authentication or file-access events on the same host

Monitoring Recommendations

Inventory installed versions of Substance 3D Painter and flag any host running 9.1.2 or earlier for prioritized patching
Ingest endpoint telemetry from creative workstations into a centralized data lake to preserve process, file, and network context for retrospective hunting
Track email and file-sharing traffic for Substance 3D Painter project files originating outside trusted vendors or internal asset pipelines

How to Mitigate CVE-2024-30274

Immediate Actions Required

Upgrade Adobe Substance 3D Painter to the fixed release identified in Adobe Security Bulletin APSB24-31
Restrict opening of Substance 3D Painter files to those sourced from trusted internal repositories or verified vendors
Communicate the risk to design, art, and 3D teams so they treat unexpected .spp or related asset files as suspicious

Patch Information

Adobe addressed CVE-2024-30274 in the security update documented in bulletin APSB24-31. Administrators should deploy the vendor-supplied update to all Substance 3D Painter installations at version 9.1.2 or earlier. Refer to the Adobe Security Update APSB24-31 for the specific fixed version and download locations.

Workarounds

Do not open Substance 3D Painter files received from untrusted or unverified sources until patching is complete
Run Painter under a standard user account without local administrator rights to limit post-exploitation impact
Apply application allowlisting to prevent Substance 3D Painter from spawning shells or script interpreters

bash

# Windows: identify hosts running vulnerable Substance 3D Painter versions
Get-CimInstance -ClassName Win32_Product |
  Where-Object { $_.Name -like "*Substance 3D Painter*" } |
  Select-Object Name, Version, InstallDate