Adobe has patched a vulnerability in its flagship document-reading apps, Acrobat DC, Reader DC and Acrobat 2024, that hackers have been actively exploiting for a minimum of 4 months.
The vulnerability, formally tracked as CVE-2026-34621, permits hackers to remotely plant malware on an individual’s gadget by tricking them into opening a maliciously crafted PDF file on their Home windows gadget or macOS pc. The exploit targets a vulnerability in some variations of the Adobe Reader software program.
It’s not but recognized how many individuals have been affected by this hacking marketing campaign. In a notice on its web site, Adobe stated it was conscious that the bug is being exploited within the wild, often called a zero-day, indicating that hackers have been utilizing it to interrupt into folks’s computer systems earlier than Adobe may repair it.
Whereas it’s not clear who’s behind the hacking marketing campaign, the ubiquity of Adobe’s PDF-reading software program makes it a constant goal for cyber criminals and government-backed hackers, who’ve lengthy abused weaknesses within the software program to steal information from folks’s computer systems.
Safety researcher Haifei Li, who runs the exploit-detection system EXPMON, found the vulnerability after somebody uploaded a replica of a malicious PDF containing the exploit to his malware scanner. In a weblog publish, Li wrote that one other copy of the malware-ridden PDF first appeared on VirusTotal, one other on-line malware scanner, in late November 2025.
It’s not clear who the hacking marketing campaign was concentrating on or for what purpose, and Li stated it was not potential to acquire any extra exploits from the hacker’s servers. However based on Li’s evaluation, opening a malicious PDF and triggering the exploit “may result in full management of the sufferer’s system” and provides the hacker the flexibility to steal a variety of information.
Adobe stated Acrobat DC, Reader DC, and Acrobat 2024 are affected, and urged customers to replace their software program to the newest variations.
