Several problems have been discovered in Mozilla, the web browser of the Mozilla suite. Since the usual praxis of backporting apparently does not work for this package, this update is basically version 1.7.10 with the version number rolled back, and hence still named 1.7.8. The Common Vulnerabilities and Exposures project identifies the following problems :

  - CAN-2004-0718, CAN-2005-1937     A vulnerability has been discovered in Mozilla that     allows remote attackers to inject arbitrary JavaScript     from one page into the frameset of another site.

  - CAN-2005-2260

    The browser user interface does not properly distinguish     between user-generated events and untrusted synthetic     events, which makes it easier for remote attackers to     perform dangerous actions that normally could only be     performed manually by the user.

  - CAN-2005-2261

    XML scripts ran even when JavaScript disabled.

  - CAN-2005-2263

    It is possible for a remote attacker to execute a     callback function in the context of another domain (i.e.
    frame).

  - CAN-2005-2265

    Missing input sanitising of InstallVersion.compareTo()     can cause the application to crash.

  - CAN-2005-2266

    Remote attackers could steal sensitive information such     as cookies and passwords from websites by accessing data     in alien frames.

  - CAN-2005-2268

    It is possible for a JavaScript dialog box to spoof a     dialog box from a trusted site and facilitates phishing     attacks.

  - CAN-2005-2269

    Remote attackers could modify certain tag properties of     DOM nodes that could lead to the execution of arbitrary     script or code.

  - CAN-2005-2270

    The Mozilla browser family does not properly clone base     objects, which allows remote attackers to execute     arbitrary code.

We experienced that the update for Mozilla Firefox from DSA 779-1 unfortunately was a regression in several cases.  Since the usual praxis of backporting apparently does not work, this update is basically version 1.0.6 with the version number rolled back, and hence still named 1.0.4-*.  For completeness below is the original advisory text :

  Several problems have been discovered in Mozilla Firefox, a   lightweight web browser based on Mozilla. The Common Vulnerabilities   and Exposures project identifies the following problems :

    - CAN-2005-2260       The browser user interface does not properly       distinguish between user-generated events and       untrusted synthetic events, which makes it easier for       remote attackers to perform dangerous actions that       normally could only be performed manually by the user.

    - CAN-2005-2261

      XML scripts ran even when JavaScript disabled.

    - CAN-2005-2262

      The user can be tricked to executing arbitrary       JavaScript code by using a JavaScript URL as       wallpaper.

    - CAN-2005-2263

      It is possible for a remote attacker to execute a       callback function in the context of another domain       (i.e. frame).

    - CAN-2005-2264

      By opening a malicious link in the sidebar it is       possible for remote attackers to steal sensitive       information.

    - CAN-2005-2265

      Missing input sanitising of InstallVersion.compareTo()       can cause the application to crash.

    - CAN-2005-2266

      Remote attackers could steal sensitive information       such as cookies and passwords from websites by       accessing data in alien frames.

    - CAN-2005-2267

      By using standalone applications such as Flash and       QuickTime to open a javascript: URL, it is possible       for a remote attacker to steal sensitive information       and possibly execute arbitrary code.

    - CAN-2005-2268

      It is possible for a JavaScript dialog box to spoof a       dialog box from a trusted site and facilitates       phishing attacks.

    - CAN-2005-2269

      Remote attackers could modify certain tag properties       of DOM nodes that could lead to the execution of       arbitrary script or code.

    - CAN-2005-2270

      The Mozilla browser family does not properly clone       base objects, which allows remote attackers to execute       arbitrary code.

A number of vulnerabilities were reported and fixed in Mozilla 1.7.9.
The following vulnerabilities have been backported and patched for this update :

In several places the browser UI did not correctly distinguish between true user events, such as mouse clicks or keystrokes, and synthetic events genenerated by web content. The problems ranged from minor annoyances like switching tabs or entering full-screen mode, to a variant on MFSA 2005-34 Synthetic events are now prevented from reaching the browser UI entirely rather than depend on each potentially spoofed function to protect itself from untrusted events (MFSA 2005-45).

Scripts in XBL controls from web content continued to be run even when JavaScript was disabled. By itself this causes no harm, but it could be combined with most script-based exploits to attack people running vulnerable versions who thought disabling JavaScript would protect them. In the Thunderbird and Mozilla Suite mail clients JavaScript is disabled by default for protection against denial-of-service attacks and worms; this vulnerability could be used to bypass that protection (MFSA 2005-46).

The InstallTrigger.install() method for launching an install accepts a callback function that will be called with the final success or error status. By forcing a page navigation immediately after calling the install method this callback function can end up running in the context of the new page selected by the attacker. This is true even if the user cancels the unwanted install dialog: cancel is an error status. This callback script can steal data from the new page such as cookies or passwords, or perform actions on the user's behalf such as make a purchase if the user is already logged into the target site. In Firefox the default settings allow only http://addons.mozilla.org to bring up this install dialog. This could only be exploited if users have added questionable sites to the install whitelist, and if a malicious site can convince you to install from their site that's a much more powerful attack vector. In the Mozilla Suite the whitelist feature is turned off by default, any site can prompt the user to install software and exploit this vulnerability. The browser has been fixed to clear any pending callback function when switching to a new site (MFSA 2005-48).

When InstallVersion.compareTo() is passed an object rather than a string it assumed the object was another InstallVersion without verifying it. When passed a different kind of object the browser would generally crash with an access violation. shutdown has demonstrated that different JavaScript objects can be passed on some OS versions to get control over the instruction pointer. We assume this could be developed further to run arbitrary machine code if the attacker can get exploit code loaded at a predictable address (MFSA 2005-50).

The original frame-injection spoofing bug was fixed in the Mozilla Suite 1.7 and Firefox 0.9 releases. This protection was accidentally bypassed by one of the fixes in the Firefox 1.0.3 and Mozilla Suite 1.7.7 releases (MFSA 2005-51).

A child frame can call top.focus() even if the framing page comes from a different origin and has overridden the focus() routine. The call is made in the context of the child frame. The attacker would look for a target site with a framed page that makes this call but doesn't verify that its parent comes from the same site. The attacker could steal cookies and passwords from the framed page, or take actions on behalf of a signed-in user. This attack would work only against sites that use frames in this manner (MFSA 2005-52).

Alerts and prompts created by scripts in web pages are presented with the generic title [JavaScript Application] which sometimes makes it difficult to know which site created them. A malicious page could attempt to cause a prompt to appear in front of a trusted site in an attempt to extract information such as passwords from the user. In the fixed version these prompts will contain the hostname from the page which created it (MFSA 2005-54).

Parts of the browser UI relied too much on DOM node names without taking different namespaces into account and verifying that nodes really were of the expected type. An XHTML document could be used to create fake <IMG> elements, for example, with content-defined properties that the browser would access as if they were the trusted built-in properties of the expected HTML elements. The severity of the vulnerability would depend on what the attacker could convince the victim to do, but could result in executing user-supplied script with elevated 'chrome' privileges. This could be used to install malicious software on the victim's machine (MFSA 2005-55).

Improper cloning of base objects allowed web content scripts to walk up the prototype chain to get to a privileged object. This could be used to execute code with enhanced privileges (MFSA 2005-56).

The updated packages have been patched to address these issue. This update also brings the mozilla shipped in Mandriva Linux 10.1 to version 1.7.8 to ease maintenance. As a result, new galeon and epiphany packages are also available for 10.1, and community contribs packages that are built against mozilla have been rebuilt and are also available via contribs.

ID	Name	Product	Family	Published	Updated	Severity
19685	Debian DSA-810-1 : mozilla - several vulnerabilities	Nessus	Debian Local Security Checks	9/13/2005	1/4/2021	high
19476	Debian DSA-779-2 : mozilla-firefox - several vulnerabilities	Nessus	Debian Local Security Checks	8/23/2005	1/4/2021	high
19888	Mandrake Linux Security Advisory : mozilla (MDKSA-2005:128)	Nessus	Mandriva Local Security Checks	10/5/2005	1/6/2021	high

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