[Updated]

Brief Hands-On Report--Apple QuickTime 7.1 Update

Apple released QuickTime 7.1 for Intel- and PowerPC-based Macs and for Mac OS X 10.3.9 and 10.4.x, client and server editions. It is available via the Software Update application or from this Apple Web page. According to the ReadMe file,

QuickTime 7.1 delivers numerous important bug fixes and addresses critical security issues. This update is highly recommended for all QuickTime 7 users.

Here are the details of the security updates:

CVE-ID: CVE-2006-1458 Viewing a maliciously-crafted JPEG image may result in an application crash or arbitrary code execution
Description: By carefully crafting a corrupt JPEG image, an
attacker can trigger an integer overflow which may result in an
application crash or arbitrary code execution with the
privileges of the user. This update addresses the issue by
performing additional validation of JPEG images.

CVE-ID: CVE-2006-1459, CVE-2006-1460 Viewing a maliciously-crafted QuickTime movie may result in an application crash or arbitrary code execution
Description: By carefully crafting a corrupt QuickTime movie, an
attacker can trigger an integer overflow or buffer overflow
which may result in an application crash or arbitrary code
execution with the privileges of the user. This update addresses
the issue by performing additional validation of QuickTime
movies. Credit to Mike Price of McAfee AVERT Labs for reporting
these issues.

CVE-ID: CVE-2006-1461 Viewing a maliciously-crafted Flash movie may result in an application crash or arbitrary code execution
Description: By carefully crafting a corrupt Flash movie, an
attacker can trigger a buffer overflow which may result in an
application crash or arbitrary code execution with the
privileges of the user. This update addresses the issue by
performing additional validation of QuickTime movies. Credit to
Mike Price of McAfee AVERT Labs for reporting this issue.

CVE-ID: CVE-2006-1462, CVE-2006-1463 Viewing a maliciously-crafted H.264 movie may result in an application crash or arbitrary code execution
Description: By carefully crafting a corrupt H.264 movie, an
attacker can trigger an integer overflow or buffer overflow
which may result in an application crash or arbitrary code
execution with the privileges of the user. This update addresses
the issue by performing additional validation of H.264 movies.
Credit to Mike Price of McAfee AVERT Labs and ATmaCA working
through TippingPoint and the Zero Day Initiative for reporting
these issues.

CVE-ID: CVE-2006-1464 Viewing a maliciously-crafted MPEG4 movie may result in an application crash or arbitrary code execution
Description: By carefully crafting a corrupt MPEG4 movie, an
attacker can trigger a buffer overflow which may result in an
application crash or arbitrary code execution with the
privileges of the user. This update addresses the issue by
performing additional validation of MPEG4 movies. Credit to Mike
Price of McAfee AVERT Labs for reporting this issue.

CVE-ID: CVE-2006-1249 Viewing a maliciously-crafted FlashPix image may result in an application crash or arbitrary code execution
Description: By carefully crafting a corrupt FlashPix image, an
attacker can trigger an integer overflow which may result in an
application crash or arbitrary code execution with the
privileges of the user. This update addresses the issue by
performing additional validation of FlashPix images. Credit to
eEye Digital Security and Mike Price of McAfee AVERT Labs for
reporting these issues.

CVE-ID: CVE-2006-1465 Viewing a maliciously-crafted AVI movie may result in an application crash or arbitrary code execution
Description: By carefully crafting a corrupt AVI movie, an
attacker can trigger a buffer overflow which may result in an
application crash or arbitrary code execution with the
privileges of the user. This update addresses the issue by
performing additional validation of AVI movies. Credit to Mike
Price of McAfee AVERT Labs for reporting this issue.

CVE-ID: CVE-2006-1453, CVE-2006-1454 Viewing a maliciously-crafted PICT image may result in an application crash or arbitrary code execution
Description: Two issues affect QuickDraw when processing PICT
images. Malformed font information may cause a stack buffer
overflow, and malformed image data may cause a heap buffer
overflow. By carefully crafting a malicious PICT image, an
attacker may be able to cause arbitrary code execution when the
image is viewed. This update addresses the issue by performing
additional validation of PICT images. Credit to Mike Price of
McAfee AVERT Labs for reporting these issues.

CVE-ID: CVE-2006-2238 Viewing a maliciously-crafted BMP image may result in an application crash or arbitrary code execution
Description: By carefully crafting a corrupt BMP image, an
attacker can trigger a buffer overflow which may result in an
application crash or arbitrary code execution with the
privileges of the user. This update addresses the issue by
performing additional validation of BMP images.
This issue was originally identified in CVE-2006-1983, but a new
CVE name was assigned.

To serve as your unofficial bleeding-edge tester, we downloaded QuickTime 7.1 via the Software Update application and installed it on an iMac Core Duo, MacBook Pro, Power Mac G4 Cube, iMac G5 and PowerBook G4. We ran into no problems doing so. After several hours use, running trailers and the Macworld 2006 keynote, we have not seen any issues.

Reader James Reid wrote us that QuickTime 7.1 did not fix the issue with DiskWarrior 3.0.3 crashing on exit that began with QuickTime 7.0.4.

[Update: With James Reid's assistance, we confirmed this unexpected quit in QuickTime 7.1. However, it seems to do no harm and can be eliminated by renaming a Diskwarrior file according to this procedure, credited to a MacFixIt Forum post]

[Bill Fox & Dana Baggett]