3.3 - RHSA-2010:0651

Problem Description:

An updated spice-xpi package that fixes two security issues and three bugs is now available for Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5.

The Red Hat Security Response Team 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.

2. Relevant releases/architectures:

RHEL Optional Productivity Applications (v. 5 server) - i386, x86_64 Red Hat Enterprise Linux Desktop (v. 5 client) - i386, x86_64

3. Description:

The Simple Protocol for Independent Computing Environments (SPICE) is a remote display protocol used in Red Hat Enterprise Linux for viewing virtualized guests running on the Kernel-based Virtual Machine (KVM) hypervisor, or on Red Hat Enterprise Virtualization Hypervisor.

The spice-xpi package provides a plug-in that allows the SPICE client to run from within Mozilla Firefox.

A race condition was found in the way the SPICE Firefox plug-in and the SPICE client communicated. A local attacker could use this flaw to trick the plug-in and the SPICE client into communicating over an attacker-controlled socket, possibly gaining access to authentication details, or resulting in a man-in-the-middle attack on the SPICE connection. (CVE-2010-2792)

It was found that the SPICE Firefox plug-in used a predictable name for its log file. A local attacker could use this flaw to conduct a symbolic link attack, allowing them to overwrite arbitrary files accessible to the user running Firefox. (CVE-2010-2794)

This update also fixes the following bugs:

* a bug prevented users of Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5.5, with all updates applied, from running the SPICE Firefox plug-in when using Firefox 3.6.4. With this update, the plug-in works correctly with Firefox 3.6.4 and the latest version in Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5.5, Firefox 3.6.7. (BZ#618244)

* unused code has been removed during source code refactoring. This also resolves a bug in the SPICE Firefox plug-in that caused it to close random file descriptors. (BZ#594006, BZ#619067)

Note: This update should be installed together with the RHSA-2010:0632 qspice-client update: https://rhn.redhat.com/errata/RHSA-2010-0632.html

Users of spice-xpi should upgrade to this updated package, which contains backported patches to correct these issues. After installing the update, Firefox must be restarted for the changes to take effect.

4. Solution:

Before applying this update, make sure all previously-released errata relevant to your system have been applied.

This update is available via the Red Hat Network. Details on how to use the Red Hat Network to apply this update are available at http://kbase.redhat.com/faq/docs/DOC-11259

5. Bugs fixed (http://bugzilla.redhat.com/):

618244 - SPICE-XPI : Spice cannot be opened from RHEL5.5 client user-portal using FireFox 3.6.4. 620350 - CVE-2010-2792 spice-xpi/qspice-client unix socket race 620356 - CVE-2010-2794 spice-xpi symlink attack