Re: Security risks when invoking ghostscript

* Giuseppe Sacco <[email protected]> [100602 16:49]:
> Hi all,
> it seems ghostscript look for all files in current directory before
> searching in its preferred path. This is its default behaviour. The way
> to disable it, is to use option "-P-"[1]. There a few bug reports
> signalling this problem, as for [2] (the latest one) and [3] (the first
> one).
> 
> What is your opinion about this problem when gs is invoked by hylafax?
> Is there any real risks?

I haven't done a *thourough* investigation, but AFAIK, the "files" it
reads from . are a fixed set (like gsinit, etc), and not something the
user can "name" like (tmp/bla).

If that stands true, then HylaFAX doesn't need to consert itself,
because only the admin can place files directly in /var/spool/hylafax
(and that's where  HF always runs GS from).

If the files GS tries to load are dependant on user content (i.e could
be make to try and load tmp/bla) then it could affect HylaFAX.

But either way, the -P- option sounds preferable... I've given it a
quick spin on a test, but if others want to test it out on a wide range
of GS versions, I'ld think it's a good change to make.

a.

-- 
Aidan Van Dyk                                             [email protected]
Senior Software Developer                          +1 215 825-8700 x8103
iFAX Solutions, Inc.                                http://www.ifax.com/

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