RHEL 6 : file (RHSA-2014:1606)
Medium Nessus Plugin ID 78414
Synopsis
The remote Red Hat host is missing one or more security updates.
Description
Updated file packages that fix multiple security issues and several bugs are now available for Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6.
Red Hat Product Security has rated this update as having Moderate security impact. Common Vulnerability Scoring System (CVSS) base scores, which give detailed severity ratings, are available for each vulnerability from the CVE links in the References section.
The 'file' command is used to identify a particular file according to the type of data contained in the file. The command can identify various file types, including ELF binaries, system libraries, RPM packages, and different graphics formats.
Multiple denial of service flaws were found in the way file parsed certain Composite Document Format (CDF) files. A remote attacker could use either of these flaws to crash file, or an application using file, via a specially crafted CDF file. (CVE-2014-0237, CVE-2014-0238, CVE-2014-3479, CVE-2014-3480, CVE-2012-1571)
Two denial of service flaws were found in the way file handled indirect and search rules. A remote attacker could use either of these flaws to cause file, or an application using file, to crash or consume an excessive amount of CPU. (CVE-2014-1943, CVE-2014-2270)
This update also fixes the following bugs :
* Previously, the output of the 'file' command contained redundant white spaces. With this update, the new STRING_TRIM flag has been introduced to remove the unnecessary white spaces. (BZ#664513)
* Due to a bug, the 'file' command could incorrectly identify an XML document as a LaTex document. The underlying source code has been modified to fix this bug and the command now works as expected.
(BZ#849621)
* Previously, the 'file' command could not recognize .JPG files and incorrectly labeled them as 'Minix filesystem'. This bug has been fixed and the command now properly detects .JPG files. (BZ#873997)
* Under certain circumstances, the 'file' command incorrectly detected NETpbm files as 'x86 boot sector'. This update applies a patch to fix this bug and the command now detects NETpbm files as expected.
(BZ#884396)
* Previously, the 'file' command incorrectly identified ASCII text files as a .PIC image file. With this update, a patch has been provided to address this bug and the command now correctly recognizes ASCII text files. (BZ#980941)
* On 32-bit PowerPC systems, the 'from' field was missing from the output of the 'file' command. The underlying source code has been modified to fix this bug and 'file' output now contains the 'from' field as expected. (BZ#1037279)
* The 'file' command incorrectly detected text files as 'RRDTool DB version ool - Round Robin Database Tool'. This update applies a patch to fix this bug and the command now correctly detects text files.
(BZ#1064463)
* Previously, the 'file' command supported only version 1 and 2 of the QCOW format. As a consequence, file was unable to detect a 'qcow2 compat=1.1' file created on Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7. With this update, support for QCOW version 3 has been added so that the command now detects such files as expected. (BZ#1067771)
All file users are advised to upgrade to these updated packages, which contain backported patches to correct these issues.
Solution
Update the affected packages.