USN-4951-1: Flatpak vulnerability

12 May 2021

A Flatpak application could access files that it would not normally be permitted to access.

Reduce your security exposure

Ubuntu Pro provides ten-year security coverage to 25,000+ packages in Main and Universe repositories, and it is free for up to five machines.

Learn more about Ubuntu Pro

Releases

Packages

  • flatpak - Application deployment framework for desktop apps

Details

Anton Lydike discovered that Flatpak did not properly handle special tokens
in desktop files. An attacker could use this to specially craft a Flatpak
application that could escape sandbox confinement.

Reduce your security exposure

Ubuntu Pro provides ten-year security coverage to 25,000+ packages in Main and Universe repositories, and it is free for up to five machines.

Learn more about Ubuntu Pro

Update instructions

The problem can be corrected by updating your system to the following package versions:

Ubuntu 20.10
Ubuntu 20.04
Ubuntu 18.04

In general, a standard system update will make all the necessary changes.

References

Join the discussion

Need help with your security needs?

Ubuntu Pro provides up to ten-year security coverage for over 23,000 open-source packages within the Ubuntu Main and Universe repositories.

Talk to an expert to find out what would work best for you

Further reading