CVE-2026-63729 — TeX Live SyncTeX Parser Heap Use-After-Free via Malformed SyncTeX File
The SyncTeX parser (synctex_parser.c) shipped with TeX Live and embedded by downstream consumers such as GNOME Evince contains a heap use-after-free vulnerability that allows at…
Published: 2026-07-21 · CVSS: 6.8 · CVSS 4.0
The SyncTeX parser (synctex_parser.c) shipped with TeX Live and embedded by downstream consumers such as GNOME Evince contains a heap use-after-free vulnerability that allows attackers to crash applications or potentially execute arbitrary code by supplying a malformed .synctex or .synctex.gz file. A malformed SyncTeX file can construct a ref node with a NULL parent pointer, causing the replacement routine to fail to detach the node from its sibling chain, which triggers recursive freeing of live tree nodes and leaves dangling pointers that are later accessed by the parser during document load.
Source: CVE Program · Revision 8b16575c39f1e1810c5e863010da073d2d3285e7