QuickTime flaw could open Windows PCs to hackers

Firefox users most vulnerable; Internet Explorer users should be wary too.

Polish security researcher Krystian Kloskowski has

published

a proof-of-concept exploit for a vulnerability in

Apple

‘s

QuickTime

media player. The exploit, which makes use of a vulnerability in the way the RTSP-protocol is handled by

QuickTime

, could give hackers access to PCs that run

Windows XP

or

Vista

.

Researchers at

Symantec

, who published a

detailed investigation

into the exploit, say there are two ways for users to be affected: either by opening a malicious attachment in an email, or by browsing to a website that has a malicious

QuickTime

streaming object embedded into it. In the latter case,

Symantec

reports that the current exploit only affects

Firefox

users that have set

QuickTime

as their default multimedia player. However, it is very well possible for the exploit to be refined in the next few days, so that it might affect those browsing with

Internet Explorer

as well.

Until a patch has been released, system administrators are advised to close TCP 554 for outbound connections.

Posted on 27 November 2007 by

Virus Bulletin