Clipped info from Windows screenshots can be retrieved by bug

Clipped info from screenshots made with Snipping Tool from Windows can be recovered due to a bug. So says a researcher. He recently published about the same bug that works on Pixel phones.

Researcher David Buchanan confirms findings from software engineer Chris Blume that the bug aCropalypse also works on Windows. Due to the bug, parts that have been cut or blurred in the original image can be partially or completely reconstructed. This is because the software does not delete the bytes of the original image, but only overwrites it, leaving parts that have not been overwritten in the file.

The same exploit works with minimal modifications, Buchanan says. The pixel format is different, because Snipping Tool uses an RGBA format, red-green-blue-alpha, as opposed to the RGB format of the Pixel phones.

Microsoft has not yet responded to the finding, which may allow private data from screenshots to be retrieved. Google has already responded: the company has fixed the bug in the March update for many of its Pixel phones. The bug has been in the system since Android 10 and is due to an error which had been known for several years. It is unknown whether the vulnerability was exploited.

Snipping program Windows 11 aCropalypse: information that has been cut out can be reconstructed