thttpd: Unauthenticated remote file access

1.  Gentoo Linux Security Advisory

Version Information

Related bugreports: #142047

Synopsis

The default configuration of the Gentoo thttpd package potentially allows unauthenticated access to system files when used with newer versions of baselayout.

2.  Impact Information

Background

thttpd is a webserver designed to be simple, small, and fast.

Description

thttpd is vulnerable to an underlying change made to the start-stop-daemon command in the current stable Gentoo baselayout package (version 1.12.6). In the new version, the start-stop-daemon command performs a "chdir /" command just before starting the thttpd process. In the Gentoo default configuration, this causes thttpd to start with the document root set to "/", the sytem root directory.

Impact

When thttpd starts with the document root set to the system root directory, all files on the system that are readable by the thttpd process can be remotely accessed by unauthenticated users.

3.  Resolution Information

Workaround

Alter the THTTPD_OPTS variable in /etc/conf.d/thttpd to include the "-d" option to specify the document root. Alternatively, modify the THTTPD_OPTS variable in /etc/conf.d/thttpd to specify a thttpd.conf file using the "-C" option, and then configure the "dir=" directive in that thttpd.conf file.

Resolution

All thttpd users should upgrade to the latest version:

# emerge --sync
# emerge --ask --oneshot --verbose ">=www-servers/thttpd-2.25b-r5"

4.  References

• CVE-2007-0664