Google Project Zero reported two Zoom vulnerabilities in January 2022: a buffer overflow affecting Zoom clients and Multimedia Router (MMR) servers, and an information leak affecting MMR servers. Researcher Natalie Silvanovich said Zoom fixed both on November 24, 2021. Her report described a potential risk to some meetings if an MMR server were compromised; it did not report a successful exploit of Zoom’s public servers or confirmed meeting interception.
What Project Zero found
In “Zooming in on Zero-click Exploits,” published January 18, 2022, Project Zero researcher Natalie Silvanovich described two flaws she had reported to Zoom:
- Buffer overflow: affected Zoom clients and MMR servers.
- Information leak: affected MMR servers and could provide information useful to attackers.
These are distinct findings: the buffer overflow affected both client software and servers, while the information leak was reported on the server side.
Why the MMR server mattered
In Zoom’s on-premises deployment, a Multimedia Router is a host that transmits audio and video between Zoom clients. Because the MMR processes meeting media, Silvanovich warned that compromising one could have serious consequences for meetings without end-to-end encryption.
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She wrote: “The vulnerabilities in Zoom’s MMR server are especially concerning, as this server processes meeting audio and video content, so a compromise could allow an attacker to monitor any Zoom meetings that do not have end-to-end encryption enabled.” That is a conditional risk assessment—not evidence that an attacker compromised an MMR or monitored meetings.
What the researcher did—and did not—demonstrate
Silvanovich attempted to exploit her local MMR server but was not successful. She said she completed parts of the exploitation process and believed an attacker could exploit the vulnerabilities with sufficient investment. The report does not establish a working exploit against a public Zoom service or confirmed exploitation in the wild.
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When Zoom fixed the flaws
Silvanovich’s conclusion states: “Both of these vulnerabilities were fixed on November 24, 2021.” The report is therefore a historical account of vulnerabilities that Zoom said it had remediated before the analysis was published, not a notice that these specific issues remain unpatched today.
MMR hardening with ASLR
Silvanovich reported that the MMR process did not use Address Space Layout Randomization (ASLR) during her research. She said ASLR was enabled in MMR version 4.6.20211128.136, released November 28, 2021. She regarded the change as positive but cautioned that ASLR alone would not guarantee safety if similar vulnerabilities remained.
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What Zoom users should do now
Zoom’s Security Bulletins page gives general guidance: update to the latest Zoom software to receive current fixes and security improvements. That is current general advice, separate from the report’s 2021 remediation dates and version details.
Zoom also says its bulletins do not provide guidance on impacts to individual customers or additional details about a vulnerability. The sources do not establish how many customers were affected, whether any customer was compromised, or whether a particular account or meeting was exposed.
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Research cost is not an exposure estimate
Silvanovich said using the features she tested required roughly $1,500 USD in licensing fees. That figure describes a cost involved in her research; it is not an estimate of losses, the number of affected users, or the cost of exploiting the flaws.
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