Parvez Anwar has discovered a vulnerability in Vantage Linguistics AnswerWorks, which can be exploited by malicious people to compromise a user's system.

The vulnerability is caused due to a boundary error within the awApi4.AnswerWorks.1 (awApi4.dll) ActiveX control when handling arguments passed to certain methods (e.g. "GetHistory()", "GetSeedQuery()", "SetSeedQuery()"). This can be exploited to cause a stack-based buffer overflow by passing an overly long (greater than 215 bytes) argument to the affected methods.

Successful exploitation allows execution of arbitrary code when a user e.g. is tricked into visiting a malicious website.

The vulnerability is confirmed in awApi4.dll version 4.0.0.42 and affects AnswerWorks versions 3.0.0.0 to 4.0.0.100, and 5.0.0.0 to 5.0.0.6.

Solution
Apply patch.
Further details available to Secunia VIM customers

Provided and/or discovered by
Parvez Anwar

Changelog
Further details available to Secunia VIM customers

Original Advisory
Vantage Linguistics:
http://www.vantagelinguistics.com/answerworks/release/

Other references
Further details available to Secunia VIM customers

Alternate/detailed remediation
Further details available in Customer Area

Deep Links
Links available to Secunia VIM customers