VideoLAN releases VLC Media Player 3.0.24 with major security fixes

VideoLAN has released VLC Media Player version 3.0.24, a significant update focused heavily on security and core engine improvements. The release addresses more than 130 security vulnerabilities affecting both the player and its bundled libraries, including issues such as buffer overflows, integer overflows, and use-after-free errors. These vulnerabilities could potentially allow attackers to compromise a system via specially crafted malicious media files.

Technically, the update includes a major leap for the media engine, upgrading FFmpeg from version 4.4 to 8.1.2, and updating 49 third-party libraries. Other notable improvements include the addition of ATRAC3 and ATRAC9 decoding, CEA-708 closed captions in MP4, and improved subtitle language detection. The update also introduces official support for Flatpak on Linux and implements a new RSA-4096 encryption key to verify the integrity of software updates.

Platform-specific fixes address Windows audio crashes, macOS AudioToolbox MIDI synthesizer crashes, and video distortion issues on macOS Mojave. The update is available for Windows, macOS, and Linux.