Quantum Secular Labs / Blog / Advisories

CVE-2008-4211: Apple Mac OS X: Remote code execution

CVE-2008-4211 has a CVSS v2 base score of 10.0 (the maximum on that scale) and affects Apple Mac OS X, along with 1 other product in NVD’s configuration data. Per its scoring, it can be exploited over the network, without authentication. The scored impact on confidentiality, integrity and availability is the highest available.

Vulnerability description

Integer signedness error in (1) QuickLook in Apple Mac OS X 10.5.5 and (2) Office Viewer in Apple iPhone OS 1.0 through 2.1 and iPhone OS for iPod touch 1.1 through 2.1 allows remote attackers to cause a denial of service (application termination) and execute arbitrary code via a crafted Microsoft Excel file that triggers an out-of-bounds memory access, related to "handling of columns."

Severity breakdown

CVSS v2.0 10.0: AV:N/AC:L/Au:N/C:C/I:C/A:C

  • Access vector: Network. Exploitable remotely over the network.
  • Access complexity: Low. No special conditions are required.
  • Authentication: None. No authentication is needed.
  • Confidentiality impact: Complete. Total information disclosure.
  • Integrity impact: Complete. Total loss of integrity.
  • Availability impact: Complete. Total shutdown of the component.

Affected products

  • Apple Mac OS X: 10.5.5
  • Apple Iphone OS: 1.0.0; 1.0.1; 1.0.2; 1.1.0; 1.1.1; 1.1.2; 1.1.3; 1.1.4; 1.1.5; 2.0.0; 2.0.1; 2.0.2
  • Apple Mac OS X Server: 10.5.5

References