Ruby: Arbitrary command execution through XML-RPC

Background

Ruby is an interpreted scripting language for quick and easy object-oriented programming. XML-RPC is a remote procedure call protocol encoded in XML.

Description

Nobuhiro IMAI reported that an invalid default value in “utils.rb” causes the security protections of the XML-RPC server to fail.

Impact

A remote attacker could exploit this vulnerability to execute arbitrary commands.

Workaround

There is no known workaround at this time.

Resolution

All Ruby users should upgrade to the latest available version:

 # emerge --sync
 # emerge --ask --oneshot --verbose ">=dev-lang/ruby-1.8.2-r2"