Pidgin could be made to crash or run programs if it received specially crafted network traffic.
Joseph Bisch discovered that Pidgin incorrectly handled certain xml messages. A remote attacker could use this issue to cause Pidgin to crash, resulting in a denial of service, or possibly execute arbitrary code.
14 March 2017
A security issue affects these releases of Ubuntu and its derivatives:
Pidgin could be made to crash or run programs if it received specially crafted network traffic.
Joseph Bisch discovered that Pidgin incorrectly handled certain xml messages. A remote attacker could use this issue to cause Pidgin to crash, resulting in a denial of service, or possibly execute arbitrary code.
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 Pidgin to make all the necessary changes.