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Advisory: Opera may execute command line embedded in URLs

Summary

Opera will execute command lines embedded in the URL when another program uses Opera to open a link. This affects UNIX versions of Opera (Linux/FreeBSD/Solaris).

Severity: High

Problem description

Opera for UNIX uses a wrapper shell script to start up Opera. This shell script reads the input arguments, like the file names or URLs that Opera is to open. It also performs some environment checks, for example whether Java is available and if so, where it is located.

This wrapper script can also run commands embedded in the URL, so that a specially crafted URL can make arbitrary commands run on the recipient's machine. Users who have other programs set up to use Opera to open Web links are vulnerable to this flaw. For these users, clicking a Web link in for example OpenOffice.org or Evolution can run a command that was put into the link.

Opera's response

Opera has made a change to the wrapper script so that shell commands fed to the script will no longer be executed. The updated wrapper script is included in Opera 8.51 which was released November 17, 2005.

Credits

Opera wishes to thank Secunia for bringing this issue to our attention.

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