Mozilla Foundation Security Advisory 2008-14

Mozilla Foundation Security Advisory 2008-14

Title: JavaScript privilege escalation and arbitrary code execution
Impact: Critical
Announced: March 25, 2008
Reporter: moz_bug_r_a4, Boris Zbarsky, Johnny Stenback
Products: Firefox, Thunderbird, SeaMonkey

Fixed in: Firefox 2.0.0.13
Thunderbird 2.0.0.13
SeaMonkey 1.1.9
Description

Mozilla contributors moz_bug_r_a4, Boris Zbarsky, and Johnny Stenback reported a series of vulnerabilities which allow scripts from page content to run with elevated privileges. moz_bug_r_a4 demonstrated additional variants of MFSA 2007-25 and MFSA2007-35 (arbitrary code execution through XPCNativeWrapper pollution). Additional vulnerabilities reported separately by Boris Zbarsky, Johnny Stenback, and moz_bug_r_a4 showed that the browser could be forced to run JavaScript code using the wrong principal leading to universal XSS and arbitrary code execution.

Thunderbird shares the browser engine with Firefox and could be vulnerable if JavaScript were to be enabled in mail. This is not the default setting and we strongly discourage users from running JavaScript in mail.
Workaround

Disable JavaScript until a version containing these fixes can be installed.
References

* XPCNativeWrapper pollution
  CVE-2008-1233
* Universal XSS using event handlers
  CVE-2008-1234
* Privilege escalation via incorrect principals
  CVE-2008-1235