GLSA 200712-14: CUPS: Multiple vulnerabilities

Severity:high
Title:CUPS: Multiple vulnerabilities
Date:12/18/2007
Bugs: #199195, #201042, #201570
ID:200712-14

Synopsis

Multiple vulnerabilities have been discovered in CUPS, allowing for the remote execution of arbitrary code and a Denial of Service.

Background

CUPS provides a portable printing layer for UNIX-based operating systems. The alternate pdftops filter is a CUPS filter used to convert PDF files to the Postscript format via Poppler; the filter is installed by default in Gentoo Linux.

Affected packages

Package Vulnerable Unaffected Architecture(s)
net-print/cups < 1.3.5 >= 1.2.12-r4 All supported architectures

Description

Wei Wang (McAfee AVERT Research) discovered an integer underflow in the asn1_get_string() function of the SNMP backend, leading to a stack-based buffer overflow when handling SNMP responses (CVE-2007-5849). Elias Pipping (Gentoo) discovered that the alternate pdftops filter creates temporary files with predictable file names when reading from standard input (CVE-2007-6358). Furthermore, the resolution of a Denial of Service vulnerability covered in GLSA 200703-28 introduced another Denial of Service vulnerability within SSL handling (CVE-2007-4045).

Impact

A remote attacker on the local network could exploit the first vulnerability to execute arbitrary code with elevated privileges by sending specially crafted SNMP messages as a response to an SNMP broadcast request. A local attacker could exploit the second vulnerability to overwrite arbitrary files with the privileges of the user running the CUPS spooler (usually lp) by using symlink attacks. A remote attacker could cause a Denial of Service condition via the third vulnerability when SSL is enabled in CUPS.

Workaround

To disable SNMP support in CUPS, you have have to manually delete the file "/usr/libexec/cups/backend/snmp". Please note that the file is reinstalled if you merge CUPS again later. To disable the pdftops filter, delete all lines referencing "pdftops" in CUPS' "mime.convs" configuration file. To work around the third vulnerability, disable SSL support via the corresponding USE flag.

Resolution

All CUPS users should upgrade to the latest version:

    # emerge --sync
    # emerge --ask --oneshot --verbose ">=net-print/cups-1.2.12-r4"

References

Availability

This GLSA and any updates to it are available for viewing at the Gentoo Security Website: http://security.gentoo.org/glsa/glsa-200712-14.xml

Concerns?

Security is a primary focus of Gentoo Linux and ensuring the confidentiality and security of our users machines is of utmost importance to us. Any security concerns should be addressed to security@gentoo.org or alternatively, you may file a bug at https://bugs.gentoo.org.

License

Copyright 2010 Gentoo Foundation, Inc; referenced text belongs to its owner(s). The contents of this document are licensed under the Creative Commons - Attribution / Share Alike license.

Thank you!