RealPlayer vulnerable in Internet Explorer

By Robert Vamosi, CNET News.com
Wednesday, March 12, 2008 10:52 AM

Security experts are warning users to stop using the RealPlayer on Internet Explorer until a patch is released for a flaw researchers discovered which could allow code execution.

Researcher Elazar Broad has posted to the the Full Disclosure mailing list a so-called heap overflow vulnerability that makes it possible for an attacker to modify heap blocks after they are freed and overwrite certain registers.

This could allow code execution on a compromised machine. The vulnerability affects all versions of RealPlayer running under Internet Explorer.

Exploit code for this flaw has not yet been made public.

Without a patch from RealPlayer, security experts recommend disabling the killbit for the following ActiveX ClassIDs:

  • 2F542A2E-EDC9-4BF7-8CB1-87C9919F7F93;
  • CFCDAA03-8BE4-11CF-B84B-0020AFBBCCFA.

However, disabling these killbits will also remove some functionality within the player.

To avoid the loss of functionality, security experts recommend using RealPlayer in a browser that doesn't support ActiveX, such as Mozilla Firefox (for Windows and Mac).

This article was first published as a blog on CNET News.com.


WORTHWHILE?

0

0 votes
Blog

Talkback 0 comments

There are currently no comments for this post.


Tech Jobs Now!

Search for your ideal tech job:

How to protect yourself from RAID-related UREs

Enterprise Servers & Storage

An Unrecoverable Read Error during a RAID rebuild can ruin an entire day. Scott Lowe talks about UREs and how you can avoid falling victim to this silent threat.


Read more »



Buying a projector? Try an LED TV instead

Blog thumbnail

If you're thinking of buying a new projector for your office meeting room, why not consider getting an LED TV instead. LED TVs are similar to LCD TVs except that..... by Lee Lup Yuen

Read more »

Tags

  1. attack
  2. authentication and encryption
  3. blog
  4. data security
  5. e - mail
  6. hacking
  7. internet
  8. malware
  9. microsoft corp.
  10. network
  11. network security
  12. pc security
  13. researcher
  14. security
  15. security management
  16. software
  17. spam and phishing
  18. symantec corp.
  19. viruses and worms
  20. web