oss-security - npm uses predictable temporary filenames when unpacking tarballs

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Message-ID: <51DDBDC5.7020501@fifthhorseman.net>
Date: Wed, 10 Jul 2013 16:02:13 -0400
From: Daniel Kahn Gillmor <dkg@...thhorseman.net>
To: oss-security@...ts.openwall.com
CC: 715325@...s.debian.org
Subject: npm uses predictable temporary filenames when unpacking tarballs

hi oss-sec folks--

i recently learned that npm, the node.js language-specific package
manager, created predictable temporary directory names in a
world-writable filesystem (/tmp) by default when unpacking archives.

It looks like this might leave open a classic symlink race such that one
user could control the location where another user unpacked packages
coming from an npm installation.

if the superuser was the one running npm, this might have led to a
non-privileged user who wins the race getting a privilege escalation as
well, depending on the contents of the fetched package.

The issue appears to have been fixed upstream today, here:

  https://github.com/isaacs/npm/commit/f4d31693

I first learned about the problem during a related a bug report
http://bugs.debian.org/715325 (cc'ed here)

If you think this needs a CVE, could you assign one please?

Regards,

	--dkg

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