For more information regarding affected product versions, please see the Oracle Critical Patch Update - January 2008.

Oracle products and components are affected by multiple vulnerabilities. The impacts of these vulnerabilities include remote execution of arbitrary code, information disclosure, and denial of service.

Oracle has released Critical Patch Update - January 2008. This update addresses 26 vulnerabilities in different Oracle products and components.

The Critical Patch Update provides information about affected components, access and authorization required, and the impact from the vulnerabilities on data confidentiality, integrity, and availability. MetaLink customers should refer to MetaLink Note 467880.1 (login required) for more information on terms used in the Critical Patch Update.

According to Oracle, none of the vulnerabilities corrected in the Oracle Critical Patch Update affect Oracle Database Client-only installations.

In most cases, Oracle does not associate Vuln# identifiers (e.g., DB01) with other available information. If significant additional details about vulnerabilities and remediation techniques become available, we will update the Vulnerability Notes Database.

The impact of these vulnerabilities varies depending on the product, component, and configuration of the system. Potential consequences include the execution of arbitrary code or commands, information disclosure, and denial of service. Vulnerable components may be available to unauthenticated, remote attackers. An attacker who compromises an Oracle database may be able to gain access to sensitive information.

Apply the appropriate patches or upgrade as specified in the Oracle Critical Patch Update - January 2008. Note that this Critical Patch Update only lists newly corrected issues. Updates to patches for previously known issues are not listed.

As noted in the update, some patches are cumulative, others are not:

The Oracle Database, Oracle Application Server, Oracle Enterprise Manager Grid Control, Oracle E-Business Suite Applications (Release 12 only), JD Edwards EnterpriseOne, JD Edwards OneWorld Tools, PeopleSoft Enterprise Portal Applications and PeopleSoft Enterprise PeopleTools patches in the Updates are cumulative; patches for any product included in a Critical Patch Update will include all fixes for that product from the previous Critical Patch Updates.

Oracle E-Business Suite Applications Release 11i patches are not cumulative, so Oracle E-Business Suite Applications customers should refer to previous Critical Patch Updates to identify previous security fixes they want to apply. Oracle Collaboration Suite patches were cumulative up to and including the fixes provided in the April 2007 Critical Patch Update. From the July 2007 Critical Patch Update on, Oracle Collaboration Suite security fixes are delivered using the one-off patch infrastructure normally used by Oracle to deliver single bug fixes to customers.

Patches for some platforms and components were not available when the Critical Patch Update was published on January 17, 2008. Please see MetaLink Note 467880.1 (login required) for more information.

Known issues with Oracle patches are documented in the pre-installation notes and patch readme files. Please consult these documents specific to your system before applying patches.

Please see Oracle Critical Patch Update - January 2008 and Critical Patch Updates and Security Alerts.