GoKawiilCritical UEFI firmware bug CVE-2026-97631 found in widely used TianoCore EDK II code
Researchers Alex Matrosov and Dan Holmes discovered a memory-corruption flaw, rated 9.5 out of 10 in severity, in an ICMP component of TianoCore EDK II, the open-source reference code underlying UEFI firmware used by most hardware vendors including AMI, Insyde, and Phoenix. The flaw allows code execution before the operating system or protections like Secure Boot can engage, and although the initial exploit payload doesn't persist, it could be used to install other malware that runs at every boot. A planned coordinated disclosure for January was disrupted after AMI published a pull request detailing the bug and fix last month, prompting TianoCore to issue a public advisory early.