GStreamer and the state of Linux desktop security
GStreamer and the state of Linux desktop security
Posted Dec 8, 2016 9:59 UTC (Thu) by ballombe (subscriber, #9523)Parent article: GStreamer and the state of Linux desktop security
Allowing webpage to create files without the user consent is a major security issue by itself.
(it is a general security principle that arbitrary file creation is arbitrary code execution).
GStreamer and the state of Linux desktop security
Posted Dec 8, 2016 12:53 UTC (Thu)
by jtaylor (subscriber, #91739)
[Link]
Posted Dec 8, 2016 12:53 UTC (Thu) by jtaylor (subscriber, #91739) [Link]
Ideally all code would be secure and sandboxing not necessary, but this is just an unrealistic goal and you can never be sure you are done.
Restricting what a program that reads untrusted data can do is somewhat more scalable and should always be done in addition to fixing the actual bugs in these programs.
In this case restricting the tracker application does seem trivial. It should only need a very restricted set of capabilities to function.
I like apparmor for this, it is quite easy to setup profiles for your common desktop applications (browser, email, messengers, media players, ...) which can at least protect you against some untargeted attacks.
GStreamer and the state of Linux desktop security
Posted Dec 8, 2016 13:09 UTC (Thu)
by mcatanzaro (subscriber, #93033)
[Link] (1 responses)
Posted Dec 8, 2016 13:09 UTC (Thu) by mcatanzaro (subscriber, #93033) [Link] (1 responses)
Anyway, of course the real problem here is GStreamer. I guess distros are going to have to separate the -bad plugins into individual subpackages if they want to be robust to such issues.
GStreamer and the state of Linux desktop security
Posted Dec 9, 2016 1:30 UTC (Fri)
by JanC_ (guest, #34940)
[Link]
Posted Dec 9, 2016 1:30 UTC (Fri) by JanC_ (guest, #34940) [Link]
GStreamer and the state of Linux desktop security
Posted Dec 8, 2016 22:50 UTC (Thu)
by rgmoore (✭ supporter ✭, #75)
[Link]
Posted Dec 8, 2016 22:50 UTC (Thu) by rgmoore (✭ supporter ✭, #75) [Link]
It i a bit unfair to call this a GNOME vulnerability where this is squarely a chromium bug.
Pointing the finger at somebody else is a terrible way of dealing with security. Even if chromium (and Chrome) patch their projects to stop unintended downloads, that still leaves a gigantic security hole in GNOME waiting to be exploited by the next person who can figure out how to get a file onto your system. Every identified security bug needs to be patched, even if there's no obvious way of exploiting it. Once the vulnerability is known to exist, somebody will find a way to exploit it.
GStreamer and the state of Linux desktop security
Posted Dec 12, 2016 13:17 UTC (Mon)
by MarcB (subscriber, #101804)
[Link] (1 responses)
Posted Dec 12, 2016 13:17 UTC (Mon) by MarcB (subscriber, #101804) [Link] (1 responses)
GStreamer and the state of Linux desktop security
Posted Dec 12, 2016 20:07 UTC (Mon)
by flussence (guest, #85566)
[Link]
Posted Dec 12, 2016 20:07 UTC (Mon) by flussence (guest, #85566) [Link]
GStreamer and the state of Linux desktop security
Posted Dec 13, 2016 20:42 UTC (Tue)
by jwarnica (subscriber, #27492)
[Link]
Posted Dec 13, 2016 20:42 UTC (Tue) by jwarnica (subscriber, #27492) [Link]