GLSA 200412-20: NASM: Buffer overflow vulnerability

http://security.gentoo.org/

Severity:	normal
Title:	NASM: Buffer overflow vulnerability
Date:	12/20/2004
Bugs:	#74477
ID:	200412-20

Synopsis

NASM is vulnerable to a buffer overflow that allows an attacker to execute arbitrary code through the use of a malicious object file.

Background

NASM is a 80x86 assembler that has been created for portability and modularity. NASM supports Pentium, P6, SSE MMX, and 3DNow extensions. It also supports a wide range of objects formats (ELF, a.out, COFF, ...), and has its own disassembler.

Affected packages

Package	Vulnerable	Unaffected	Architecture(s)
dev-lang/nasm	<= 0.98.38	>= 0.98.38-r1	All supported architectures

Description

Jonathan Rockway discovered that NASM-0.98.38 has an unprotected vsprintf() to an array in preproc.c. This code vulnerability may lead to a buffer overflow and potential execution of arbitrary code.

Impact

A remote attacker could craft a malicious object file which, when supplied in NASM, would result in the execution of arbitrary code with the rights of the user running NASM.

Workaround

There is no known workaround at this time.

Resolution

All NASM users should upgrade to the latest version:

    # emerge --sync
    # emerge --ask --oneshot --verbose ">=dev-lang/nasm-0.98.38-r1"

References

Original Advisory

Availability

This GLSA and any updates to it are available for viewing at the Gentoo Security Website: http://security.gentoo.org/glsa/glsa-200412-20.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.