Issued:

2011-12-14

Updated:

2011-12-14

RHSA-2011:1821 - Moderate: pidgin security update

Synopsis

Moderate: pidgin security update

Type/Severity

Security Advisory Moderate

Topic

Updated pidgin packages that fix multiple security issues are now available for Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6.

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.

Description

Pidgin is an instant messaging program which can log in to multiple accounts on multiple instant messaging networks simultaneously.

An input sanitization flaw was found in the way the AOL Open System for Communication in Realtime (OSCAR) protocol plug-in in Pidgin, used by the AOL ICQ and AIM instant messaging systems, escaped certain UTF-8 characters. A remote attacker could use this flaw to crash Pidgin via a specially-crafted OSCAR message. (CVE-2011-4601)

Multiple NULL pointer dereference flaws were found in the Jingle extension of the Extensible Messaging and Presence Protocol (XMPP) protocol plug-in in Pidgin. A remote attacker could use these flaws to crash Pidgin via a specially-crafted Jingle multimedia message. (CVE-2011-4602)

Red Hat would like to thank the Pidgin project for reporting these issues. Upstream acknowledges Evgeny Boger as the original reporter of CVE-2011-4601, and Thijs Alkemade as the original reporter of CVE-2011-4602.

All Pidgin users should upgrade to these updated packages, which contain backported patches to resolve these issues. Pidgin must be restarted for this update to take effect.

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 This content is not included.https://access.redhat.com/kb/docs/DOC-11259

Affected Products

Updated Packages

• libpurple-perl-2.7.9-3.el6.2.x86_64.rpm
• libpurple-2.7.9-3.el6.2.ppc.rpm
• pidgin-debuginfo-2.7.9-3.el6.2.ppc.rpm
• pidgin-2.7.9-3.el6.2.i686.rpm
• finch-devel-2.7.9-3.el6.2.i686.rpm
• pidgin-devel-2.7.9-3.el6.2.i686.rpm
• libpurple-2.7.9-3.el6.2.x86_64.rpm
• pidgin-debuginfo-2.7.9-3.el6.2.ppc64.rpm
• pidgin-2.7.9-3.el6.2.x86_64.rpm
• finch-devel-2.7.9-3.el6.2.ppc64.rpm
• libpurple-perl-2.7.9-3.el6.2.ppc64.rpm
• finch-devel-2.7.9-3.el6.2.ppc.rpm
• libpurple-perl-2.7.9-3.el6.2.i686.rpm
• pidgin-debuginfo-2.7.9-3.el6.2.i686.rpm
• libpurple-2.7.9-3.el6.2.ppc64.rpm
• pidgin-perl-2.7.9-3.el6.2.i686.rpm
• libpurple-tcl-2.7.9-3.el6.2.i686.rpm
• libpurple-devel-2.7.9-3.el6.2.i686.rpm
• pidgin-devel-2.7.9-3.el6.2.x86_64.rpm
• libpurple-tcl-2.7.9-3.el6.2.ppc64.rpm
• pidgin-debuginfo-2.7.9-3.el6.2.x86_64.rpm
• pidgin-devel-2.7.9-3.el6.2.ppc.rpm
• finch-2.7.9-3.el6.2.ppc64.rpm
• finch-2.7.9-3.el6.2.i686.rpm
• libpurple-devel-2.7.9-3.el6.2.ppc64.rpm
• libpurple-devel-2.7.9-3.el6.2.ppc.rpm
• pidgin-perl-2.7.9-3.el6.2.x86_64.rpm
• pidgin-perl-2.7.9-3.el6.2.ppc64.rpm
• libpurple-tcl-2.7.9-3.el6.2.x86_64.rpm
• pidgin-2.7.9-3.el6.2.src.rpm
• pidgin-2.7.9-3.el6.2.ppc64.rpm
• pidgin-docs-2.7.9-3.el6.2.ppc64.rpm
• pidgin-docs-2.7.9-3.el6.2.x86_64.rpm
• finch-2.7.9-3.el6.2.x86_64.rpm
• pidgin-devel-2.7.9-3.el6.2.ppc64.rpm
• libpurple-devel-2.7.9-3.el6.2.x86_64.rpm
• finch-devel-2.7.9-3.el6.2.x86_64.rpm
• finch-2.7.9-3.el6.2.ppc.rpm
• pidgin-docs-2.7.9-3.el6.2.i686.rpm
• libpurple-2.7.9-3.el6.2.i686.rpm

Fixes

• This content is not included.BZ - 761510
• This content is not included.BZ - 761517

CVEs

• CVE-2011-4601
• CVE-2011-4602

References

• https://access.redhat.com/security/updates/classification/#moderate

Additional information

• The Red Hat security contact is This content is not included.secalert@redhat.com. More contact details at https://access.redhat.com/security/team/contact/.
• Offline Security Data data is available for integration with other systems. See Offline Security Data API to get started.