Progeny Security Advisory: Older versions of NEdit make insecure use of temp files

From:   Progeny Security Team <security@progeny.com>
Subject:        PROGENY-SA-2001-10: Older versions of NEdit make insecure use of temp files
Date:   27 Apr 2001 10:28:36 -0500
 

PROGENY SERVICE NETWORK -- SECURITY ADVISORY             PROGENY-SA-2001-10

Synopsis: Older versions of NEdit make insecure use of temp files

Software: nedit

History:
2001-04-27 Update available in Progeny archive

Affects: Progeny Debian (nedit prior to 5.1.1-1.0progeny1) Progeny Only: NO

Vendor-Status: New Version Released 5.1.1-1.0progeny1

$Id: PROGENY-SA-2001-10,v 1.1 2001/04/27 15:09:05 jdaily Exp $

DESCRIPTION

NEdit, a popular GUI editor, insecurely opens a file in /tmp for printing purposes. This vulnerability could be used by a local attacker to cause a privileged user to unwittingly overwrite a file (via a symbolic link) to which the user has write access.

SOLUTION (See also: UPDATING VIA APT-GET)

If you have NEdit installed, upgrade to a fixed version of nedit. nedit version 5.1.1-1.0progeny1 corrects the problem. For your convenience, you may upgrade to the new package.

If you aren't sure if you have NEdit installed, type:

dpkg -l nedit

...at a command prompt. If you don't have it installed, you can disregard this warning.

UPDATING VIA APT-GET

1. Ensure that your /etc/apt/sources.list file has a URI for Progeny's update repository:

deb http://archive.progeny.com/progeny updates/newton/

2. Update your cache of available packages for apt(8).

Example:

# apt-get update

3. Using apt(8), install the new package. apt(8) will download the update, verify its integrity with md5, and then install the package on your system with dpkg(8).

Example:

# apt-get install nedit

UPDATING VIA DPKG

1. Using your preferred FTP/HTTP client to retrieve the following updated files from Progeny's update archive at:

http://archive.progeny.com/progeny/updates/newton/

MD5 Checksum Filename -------------------------------- ------------------------------------- 142a511170fbf30ce2881d362787658a nedit_5.1.1-1.0progeny1_i386.deb/

Example:

# wget \
http://archive.progeny.com/progeny/updates/newton/nedit_5.1.1-1.0progeny1_i386.deb

2. Use the md5sum command on the retrieved files to verify that they match the md5sum provided in this advisory:

Example:

# md5sum nedit_5.1.1-1.0progeny1_i386.deb

3. Then install the replacement package(s) using the dpkg command.

Example:

# dpkg --install nedit_5.1.1-1.0progeny1_i386.deb

WORKAROUND

Other than removing the nedit software, no known workaround exists for this vulnerability.

MORE INFORMATION

Progeny advisories can be found at http://www.progeny.com/security/.

pub 1024D/F92D4D1F 2001-04-04 Progeny Security Team <security@progeny.com>