Bug 492098

Summary:	XFree86-xfs, xorg-x11-xfs: Unsafe usage of temporary file
Product:	[Other] Security Response	Reporter:	Jan Lieskovsky <jlieskov>
Component:	vulnerability	Assignee:	Red Hat Product Security <security-response-team>
Status:	CLOSED NOTABUG	QA Contact:
Severity:	low	Docs Contact:
Priority:	low
Version:	unspecified	CC:	krh, xgl-maint
Target Milestone:	---	Keywords:	Security
Target Release:	---
Hardware:	All
OS:	Linux
URL:	https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/xfs/+bug/299560
Whiteboard:
Fixed In Version:		Doc Type:	Bug Fix
Doc Text:		Story Points:	---
Clone Of:		Environment:
Last Closed:	2009-03-25 13:34:26 UTC	Type:	---
Regression:	---	Mount Type:	---
Documentation:	---	CRM:
Verified Versions:		Category:	---
oVirt Team:	---	RHEL 7.3 requirements from Atomic Host:
Cloudforms Team:	---	Target Upstream Version:
Embargoed:

Description Jan Lieskovsky 2009-03-25 12:00:33 UTC

A security flaw was found in the start() initscript of font server for XFree86/X.Org server. An attacker could use this flaw to cause
a symlink attack.

References:
http://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/bugreport.cgi?bug=521107
https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/xfs/+bug/299560

Comment 2 Jan Lieskovsky 2009-03-25 12:33:05 UTC

The Red Hat Security Response Team has rated this issue as having
low security impact, a future update may address this flaw.
More information regarding issue severity can be found here:
http://www.redhat.com/security/updates/classification/

Comment 3 Kristian Høgsberg 2009-03-25 13:34:26 UTC

Doesn't apply to our xfs init script.  The debian script tries to save the contents of a non-directory /tmp/.font-unix file if it exists, which  is pretty stupid.  The only reason that file would exists would be an exploit attempt.  We just delete it if it's not a directory.

Comment 4 Kristian Høgsberg 2009-03-25 13:34:50 UTC

See also bug #242903.

Comment 5 Tomas Hoger 2009-03-25 14:21:06 UTC

(In reply to comment #4)
> See also bug #242903.  

Right, this indeed looks like Debian specific.  Our init script issues were addressed via CVE-2007-3103.  The only question that remains is why that issue is not fixed in Fedora?  We seem to have changed init script in Red Hat Enterprise Linux 4 and 5 to not do chmod/chown, but that change did not make it to Fedora...