Ubuntu 16.10: USN-3139-1 Critical: Vim Code Execution Risk

ubuntu

November 29, 2016

Vim could be made run programs as your login if it opened a speciallycrafted file.

Summary

Vim could be made run programs as your login if it opened a specially

crafted file.

Software Description:

- vim: Vi IMproved - enhanced vi editor

Details:

Florian Larysch discovered that the Vim text editor did not properly

validate values for the 'filetype', 'syntax', and 'keymap' options. An

attacker could trick a user into opening a file with specially crafted

modelines and possibly execute arbitrary code with the user's privileges.

Topics Covered

security advisory security issue update local privilege escalation code execution ubuntu vim

Update Instructions

The problem can be corrected by updating your system to the following
package versions:

Ubuntu 16.10:
  vim                             2:7.4.1829-1ubuntu2.1
  vim-common                      2:7.4.1829-1ubuntu2.1
  vim-gui-common                  2:7.4.1829-1ubuntu2.1
  vim-runtime                     2:7.4.1829-1ubuntu2.1

Ubuntu 16.04 LTS:
  vim                             2:7.4.1689-3ubuntu1.2
  vim-common                      2:7.4.1689-3ubuntu1.2
  vim-gui-common                  2:7.4.1689-3ubuntu1.2
  vim-runtime                     2:7.4.1689-3ubuntu1.2

Ubuntu 14.04 LTS:
  vim                             2:7.4.052-1ubuntu3.1
  vim-common                      2:7.4.052-1ubuntu3.1
  vim-gui-common                  2:7.4.052-1ubuntu3.1
  vim-runtime                     2:7.4.052-1ubuntu3.1

Ubuntu 12.04 LTS:
  vim                             2:7.3.429-2ubuntu2.2
  vim-common                      2:7.3.429-2ubuntu2.2
  vim-gui-common                  2:7.3.429-2ubuntu2.2
  vim-runtime                     2:7.3.429-2ubuntu2.2

After a standard system update you need to restart Vim to make
all the necessary changes.