FreeType could be made to crash or run programs as your login if it opened a specially crafted font file.
It was discovered that FreeType did not correctly handle certain malformed Type 1 font files. If a user were tricked into using a specially crafted font file, a remote attacker could cause FreeType to crash or possibly execute arbitrary code with user privileges. (CVE-2011-3256)
18 November 2011
A security issue affects these releases of Ubuntu and its derivatives:
FreeType could be made to crash or run programs as your login if it opened a specially crafted font file.
It was discovered that FreeType did not correctly handle certain malformed Type 1 font files. If a user were tricked into using a specially crafted font file, a remote attacker could cause FreeType to crash or possibly execute arbitrary code with user privileges. (CVE-2011-3256)
It was discovered that FreeType did not correctly handle certain malformed CID-keyed PostScript font files. If a user were tricked into using a specially crafted font file, a remote attacker could cause FreeType to crash or possibly execute arbitrary code with user privileges. (CVE-2011-3439)
The problem can be corrected by updating your system to the following package versions:
To update your system, please follow these instructions: https://wiki.ubuntu.com/Security/Upgrades.
After a standard system update you need to restart your session to make all the necessary changes.
Vulmon