Ron Masas Exposes Dangerous Evil Code Editor Attack Method

In November 2022, Ron Masas, a security researcher at Imperva, published a report on a new drive-by attack method exploiting a vulnerability in Google Chrome. This method, dubbed the Evil Code Editor, allows attackers to execute remote code on a host machine without needing a zero-day exploit, which typically costs between $250,000 and $500,000. Masas noted that this method affects all Chromium-based web browsers, primarily focusing on macOS security mechanisms, which can be bypassed using the File System Access API. The exploitation requires user interaction to grant write access to certain files, thereby circumventing established security features. Google was notified of the vulnerability and plans to implement restrictions to mitigate these attacks, but as of now, the fix has not yet been deployed.