See how thunderbird compares to other vendors in security performance
If a user saved passwords before Thunderbird 60 and then later set a master password, an unencrypted copy of these passwords is still accessible. This is because the older stored password file was not deleted when the data was copied to a new format starting in Thunderbird 60. The new master password is added only on the new file. This could allow the exposure of stored password data outside of user expectations.
Last updated 24 July 2024
Last updated 24 July 2024
Last updated 24 July 2024
A vulnerability in the Libical libary used by Thunderbird can allow remote attackers to cause a denial of service (use-after-free) via a crafted ICS calendar file.
Matrix Javascript SDK is the Matrix Client-Server SDK for JavaScript. Starting with version 17.1.0-rc.1, improperly formed beacon events can disrupt or impede the matrix-js-sdk from functioning properly, potentially impacting the consumer's ability to process data safely. Note that the matrix-js-sdk can appear to be operating normally but be excluding or corrupting runtime data presented to the consumer. This is patched in matrix-js-sdk v19.7.0. Redacting applicable events, waiting for the sync processor to store data, and restarting the client are possible workarounds. Alternatively, redacting the applicable events and clearing all storage will fix the further perceived issues. Downgrading to an unaffected version, noting that such a version may be subject to other vulnerabilities, will additionally resolve the issue.
Matrix Javascript SDK is the Matrix Client-Server SDK for JavaScript. Prior to version 19.7.0, an attacker cooperating with a malicious homeserver can construct messages appearing to have come from another person. Such messages will be marked with a grey shield on some platforms, but this may be missing in others. This attack is possible due to the matrix-js-sdk implementing a too permissive key forwarding strategy on the receiving end. Starting with version 19.7.0, the default policy for accepting key forwards has been made more strict in the matrix-js-sdk. matrix-js-sdk will now only accept forwarded keys in response to previously issued requests and only from own, verified devices. The SDK now sets a trusted flag on the decrypted message upon decryption, based on whether the key used to decrypt the message was received from a trusted source. Clients need to ensure that messages decrypted with a key with trusted = false are decorated appropriately, for example, by showing a warning for such messages. This attack requires coordination between a malicious homeserver and an attacker, and those who trust your homeservers do not need a workaround.
Matrix Javascript SDK is the Matrix Client-Server SDK for JavaScript. Prior to version 19.7.0, an attacker cooperating with a malicious homeserver can construct messages that legitimately appear to have come from another person, without any indication such as a grey shield. Additionally, a sophisticated attacker cooperating with a malicious homeserver could employ this vulnerability to perform a targeted attack in order to send fake to-device messages appearing to originate from another user. This can allow, for example, to inject the key backup secret during a self-verification, to make a targeted device start using a malicious key backup spoofed by the homeserver. These attacks are possible due to a protocol confusion vulnerability that accepts to-device messages encrypted with Megolm instead of Olm. Starting with version 19.7.0, matrix-js-sdk has been modified to only accept Olm-encrypted to-device messages. Out of caution, several other checks have been audited or added. This attack requires coordination between a malicious home server and an attacker, so those who trust their home servers do not need a workaround.
Matrix JavaScript SDK is the Matrix Client-Server software development kit (SDK) for JavaScript. Prior to version 19.7.0, an attacker cooperating with a malicious homeserver could interfere with the verification flow between two users, injecting its own cross-signing user identity in place of one of the users’ identities. This would lead to the other device trusting/verifying the user identity under the control of the homeserver instead of the intended one. The vulnerability is a bug in the matrix-js-sdk, caused by checking and signing user identities and devices in two separate steps, and inadequately fixing the keys to be signed between those steps. Even though the attack is partly made possible due to the design decision of treating cross-signing user identities as Matrix devices on the server side (with their device ID set to the public part of the user identity key), no other examined implementations were vulnerable. Starting with version 19.7.0, the matrix-js-sdk has been modified to double check that the key signed is the one that was verified instead of just referencing the key by ID. An additional check has been made to report an error when one of the device ID matches a cross-signing key. As this attack requires coordination between a malicious homeserver and an attacker, those who trust their homeservers do not need a particular workaround.
When displaying the sender of an email, and the sender name contained the Braille Pattern Blank space character multiple times, Thunderbird would have displayed all the spaces. This could have been used by an attacker to send an email message with the attacker's digital signature, that was shown with an arbitrary sender email address chosen by the attacker. If the sender name started with a false email address, followed by many Braille space characters, the attacker's email address was not visible. Because Thunderbird compared the invisible sender address with the signature's email address, if the signing key or certificate was accepted by Thunderbird, the email was shown as having a valid digital signature.
When viewing an email message A, which contains an attached message B, where B is encrypted or digitally signed or both, Thunderbird may show an incorrect encryption or signature status. After opening and viewing the attached message B, when returning to the display of message A, the message A might be shown with the security status of message B.
An attacker could have sent a message to the parent process where the contents were used to double-index into a JavaScript object, leading to prototype pollution and ultimately attacker-controlled JavaScript executing in the privileged parent process.
If an attacker was able to corrupt the methods of an Array object in JavaScript via prototype pollution, they could have achieved execution of attacker-controlled JavaScript code in a privileged context.
When receiving an OpenPGP/MIME signed email message that contains an additional outer MIME message layer, for example a message footer added by a mailing list gateway, Thunderbird only considered the inner signed message for the signature validity. This gave the false impression that the additional contents were also covered by the digital signature. Starting with Thunderbird version 91.4.1, only the signature that belongs to the top level MIME part will be considered for the displayed status.
During the plaintext phase of the STARTTLS connection setup, protocol commands could have been injected and evaluated within the encrypted session.
The parent process would not properly check whether the Speech Synthesis feature is enabled, when receiving instructions from a child process.
When saving or opening an email attachment on macOS, Thunderbird did not set attribute com.apple.quarantine on the received file. If the received file was an application and the user attempted to open it, then the application was started immediately without asking the user to confirm.
If a Thunderbird user quoted from an HTML email, for example by replying to the email, and the email contained either a VIDEO tag with the POSTER attribute or an OBJECT tag with a DATA attribute, a network request to the referenced remote URL was performed, regardless of a configuration to block remote content. An image loaded from the POSTER attribute was shown in the composer window. These issues could have given an attacker additional capabilities when targeting releases that did not yet have a fix for CVE-2022-3033 which was reported around three months ago.
Thunderbird versions prior to 91.3.0 are vulnerable to the heap overflow described in CVE-2021-43527 when processing S/MIME messages. Thunderbird versions 91.3.0 and later will not call the vulnerable code when processing S/MIME messages that contain certificates with DER-encoded DSA or RSA-PSS signatures.
matrix-js-sdk is a Matrix messaging protocol Client-Server SDK for JavaScript. In versions prior to 19.4.0 events sent with special strings in key places can temporarily disrupt or impede the matrix-js-sdk from functioning properly, potentially impacting the consumer's ability to process data safely. Note that the matrix-js-sdk can appear to be operating normally but be excluding or corrupting runtime data presented to the consumer. This issue has been fixed in matrix-js-sdk 19.4.0 and users are advised to upgrade. Users unable to upgrade may mitigate this issue by redacting applicable events, waiting for the sync processor to store data, and restarting the client. Alternatively, redacting the applicable events and clearing all storage will often fix most perceived issues. In some cases, no workarounds are possible.
The olmsessiondescribe function in Matrix libolm before 3.2.7 is vulnerable to a buffer overflow. The Olm session object represents a cryptographic channel between two parties. Therefore, its state is partially controllable by the remote party of the channel. Attackers can construct a crafted sequence of messages to manipulate the state of the receiver's session in such a way that, for some buffer sizes, a buffer overflow happens on a call to olmsessiondescribe. Furthermore, safe buffer sizes were undocumented. The overflow content is partially controllable by the attacker and limited to ASCII spaces and digits. The known affected products are Element Web And SchildiChat Web.
Thunderbird unexpectedly enabled JavaScript in the composition area. The JavaScript execution context was limited to this area and did not receive chrome-level privileges, but could be used as a stepping stone to further an attack with other vulnerabilities.
If Thunderbird is configured to use STARTTLS for an IMAP server, and the server sends a PREAUTH response, then Thunderbird will continue with an unencrypted connection, causing email data to be sent without protection.
By encoding Unicode whitespace characters within the From email header, an attacker can spoof the sender email address that Thunderbird displays.
A crafted S/MIME message consisting of an inner encryption layer and an outer SignedData layer was shown as having a valid digital signature, although the signer might have had no access to the contents of the encrypted message, and might have stripped a different signature from the encrypted message. Previous versions had only suppressed showing a digital signature for messages with an outer multipart/signed layer.
Last updated 25 August 2025
Last updated 25 August 2025
It is possible to spoof the filename of an attachment and display an arbitrary attachment name. This could lead to a user opening a remote attachment which is a different file type than expected.
Crafted message headers can cause a Thunderbird process to hang on receiving the message.