diff --git a/libvncserver/rfbserver.c b/libvncserver/rfbserver.c
index 6ca511f..e210a32 100644
--- a/libvncserver/rfbserver.c
+++ b/libvncserver/rfbserver.c
@@ -1461,11 +1461,21 @@ char *rfbProcessFileTransferReadBuffer(rfbClientPtr cl, uint32_t length)
     int   n=0;
 
     FILEXFER_ALLOWED_OR_CLOSE_AND_RETURN("", cl, NULL);
+
     /*
-    rfbLog("rfbProcessFileTransferReadBuffer(%dlen)\n", length);
+       We later alloc length+1, which might wrap around on 32-bit systems if length equals
+       0XFFFFFFFF, i.e. SIZE_MAX for 32-bit systems. On 64-bit systems, a length of 0XFFFFFFFF
+       will safely be allocated since this check will never trigger and malloc() can digest length+1
+       without problems as length is a uint32_t.
     */
+    if(length == SIZE_MAX) {
+	rfbErr("rfbProcessFileTransferReadBuffer: too big file transfer length requested: %u", (unsigned int)length);
+	rfbCloseClient(cl);
+	return NULL;
+    }
+
     if (length>0) {
-        buffer=malloc((uint64_t)length+1);
+        buffer=malloc((size_t)length+1);
         if (buffer!=NULL) {
             if ((n = rfbReadExact(cl, (char *)buffer, length)) <= 0) {
                 if (n != 0)