Multiple security issues have been found in file, a tool to determine a file type. These vulnerabilities allow remote attackers to cause a denial of service, via resource consumption or application crash.

For the stable distribution (wheezy), these problems have been fixed in version 5.11-2+deb7u4. For the testing distribution (jessie), these problems have been fixed in version file 1:5.19-2. For the unstable distribution (sid), these problems have been fixed in version file 1:5.19-2. We recommend that you upgrade your file packages.

File tests each argument in an attempt to classify it. There are three sets of tests, performed in this order: filesystem tests, magic number tests, and language tests. The first test that succeeds causes the file type to be printed.

file on Debian Linux

This check tests the installed software version using the apt package manager.

• http://www.debian.org/security/2014/dsa-3021.html

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Updated on 2015-03-25