CVE-2004-2227

Vulnerability

Firefox versions before 1.0 truncate long filenames in the "What should Firefox do with this file?" dialog box. This allows a remote attacker to craft a filename that appears to have a benign extension while the actual extension is hidden due to truncation. Affected versions: Firefox prior to 1.0 [1][3].

Exploitation

The attacker needs only to host a malicious file on a web page and lure the user into clicking a download link. The dialog box shows a truncated filename, so the user may be misled about the file type. No authentication is required; the attack is remote [2].

Impact

Successful exploitation could trick a user into opening a file with a dangerous extension (e.g., .exe) that appears as a safe file (e.g., .txt), potentially leading to arbitrary code execution or other malicious actions [2].

Mitigation

Fixed in Firefox 1.0. Users should upgrade to version 1.0 or later. No workaround is available [1][2][3].