Welcome to Release 4.6, a security release for the DSpace 4.x platform. For information on upgrading to DSpace 4, please see Upgrading DSpace.  

4.6 Release Notes

DSpace 4.6 is a security fix release to resolve an issue located in DSpace 4.x XMLUI and JSPUI. As it only provides a security-fix, DSpace 4.6 should constitute an easy upgrade from DSpace 4.x for most users. No database changes or additional configuration changes should be necessary when upgrading from DSpace 4.x to 4.6.

This release addresses the following security issues discovered in DSpace 4.x and below:

• security fix:
  • [HIGH SEVERITY]  XML External Entity (XXE) vulnerability in pdfbox. (DS-3309 - requires a JIRA account to access)
    
    • Reported by Seth Robbins
      

4.5 Release Notes

DSpace 4.5 is a security fix release to resolve several issues located in DSpace 4.x XMLUI and JSPUI. As it only provides security-fixes, DSpace 4.5 should constitute an easy upgrade from DSpace 4.x for most users. No database changes or additional configuration changes should be necessary when upgrading from DSpace 4.x to 4.5.

This release addresses the following security issues discovered in DSpace 4.x and below:

• XMLUI security fixes:
  • [HIGH SEVERITY] The XMLUI "themes/" path is vulnerable to a full directory traversal. (DS-3094 - requires a JIRA account to access.) This means that ANY files on your system which are readable to the Tomcat user account may be publicly accessed via your DSpace website.
    • Reported by Virginia Tech
      
• JSPUI security fixes: 
  • [MEDIUM SEVERITY] The JSPUI "Edit News" feature (accessible to Administrators) can be used to view/edit ANY files which are readable to the Tomcat user account (DS-3063 - requires a JIRA account to access.)
    • Reported by CINECA

4.4 Release Notes

DSpace 4.4 is a security fix release to resolve several issues located in DSpace 4.x JSPUI. As it only provides security-fixes, DSpace 4.4 should constitute an easy upgrade from DSpace 4.x for most users. No database changes or additional configuration changes should be necessary when upgrading from DSpace 4.x to 4.4.

This release addresses the following security issues discovered in DSpace 4.x and below:

• JSPUI security fixes: 
  • [MEDIUM SEVERITY] Cross-site scripting (XSS injection) is possible in JSPUI search interface (in Firefox web browser). (DS-2736 - requires a JIRA account to access for two weeks, and then will be public): This vulnerability could allow someone to embed dangerous Javascript code into links to search results. If a user was emailed such a link and clicked it, the javascript would be run in their local browser. This vulnerability has existed since DSpace 3.x 
  • • Discovered by Genaro Contreras
      
  • [LOW SEVERITY] Expression language injection (EL Injection) is possible in JSPUI search interface. (DS-2737 - requires a JIRA account to access for two weeks, and then will be public): This vulnerability could allow someone to obtain information from the site/server using JSP syntax. This vulnerability has existed since DSpace 3.x
    • Discovered by Genaro Contreras

4.3 Release Notes

DSpace 4.3 is a security fix release to resolve several issues located in DSpace 4.x. As it only provides security-fixes, DSpace 4.3 should constitute an easy upgrade from DSpace 4.x for most users. No database changes or additional configuration changes should be necessary when upgrading from DSpace 4.x to 4.3.

This release addresses the following security issues discovered in DSpace 4.x and below:

• XMLUI Security Fixes
  

  • [HIGH SEVERITY] XMLUI Directory Traversal Vulnerabilities (DS-2445 - requires a JIRA account to access for two weeks, and then will be public): These vulnerabilities allow someone to potentially access any file on your local filesystem which is readable to the Tomcat user account. This includes files which are unrelated to DSpace or Tomcat, but are readable to all users on the filesystem (e.g. /etc/passwd, /etc/hosts, etc.). This also includes Tomcat configuration files (which may or may not contain passwords). These vulnerabilities have existed since DSpace 1.5.2.

    • Discovered by: Khalil Shreateh, with additional (related) vulnerabilities discovered by the DSpace Committer Team

  • In some configurations of Tomcat, simply removing any "allowLinking=true" settings from your Tomcat's <Context> configuration will limit the directory traversal vulnerability's severity to only allow access to files within the XMLUI web application directory. In addition, the Tomcat documentation details "allowLinking=true" as a possible security concern.  However, you still must upgrade or patch your DSpace in order to completely resolve this vulnerability.
• JSPUI Security Fixes
  • [MEDIUM SEVERITY] JSPUI Directory Traversal Vulnerability (DS-2448 - requires a JIRA account to access for two weeks, and then will be public): This vulnerability allows someone to potentially access any file within the JSPUI web application directory (e.g. WEB-INF/web.xml). This vulnerability is believed to have existed in all prior versions of DSpace.
    • Discovered by Khalil Shreateh
      
  • [LOW SEVERITY] Cross-site scripting (XSS injection) is possible in JSPUI Recent Submissions listings (DS-1702 - requires a JIRA account to access for two weeks, and then will be public): This vulnerability could allow a depositor/submitter to embed dangerous Javascript code into the metadata of a new submission, thus causing that code to be run across other user accounts. However, this vulnerability is only possible by someone with privileges to add content to your DSpace site. This vulnerability has existed since DSpace 1.5.x.
    
    • Discovered by: Jean-Paul Zhao of University of Toronto
      
  • [LOW SEVERITY] Cross-site scripting (XSS injection) is possible in JSPUI Discovery search form (DS-2044 - requires a JIRA account to access for two weeks, and then will be public): This vulnerability could allow someone to embed dangerous Javascript code into links to search results. If a user was emailed such a link and clicked it, the javascript would be run in their local browser. This vulnerability has existed since DSpace 3.x
    • 4.x / 5.x vulnerability discovered by  Gabriela Mircea of McMaster University and Khalil Shreateh
    • 3.x vulnerability discovered by İlyas Orak of Biznet Bilisim A.S.

4.2 Release Notes

DSpace 4.2 provides bug-fixes and minor improvements to the 4.x platform. As it only provides bug-fixes, DSpace 4.2 should constitute an easy upgrade from DSpace 4.x for most users. No database changes or additional configuration changes should be necessary when upgrading from DSpace 4.x to 4.2 (except for  DS-2036 which may affect some Oracle users ; see  Fixing the effects of DS-2036 ).

Issues which have been resolved in 4.2 include:

• Fixed occasional "Out of Memory" errors when indexing large bitstreams/files in Discovery (DS-1958)

• Fixed issue where REST API was not releasing "context" and ignored database pooling (DS-1986)

• Fixed Solr commit delays when "did you mean" functionality is enabled in Discovery (DS-2060)

• Fixed the "dspace classpath" command (DS-1998)

• Fixed issue where thumbnails were not displayed when using JSPUI + Oracle database (DS-2013)

• Fixed validation of OAI-PMH response (DS-1928)
• Fixed several Oracle database upgrade script errors (DS-2036, DS-2038, DS-2056, and DS-1957)
• Fixed Maven build issue on Windows operating systems (DS-1940)
• Other minor fixes See Changes in 4.x section for a list of all fixes.

4.1 Release Notes

DSpace 4.1 provides bug-fixes and minor improvements to the 4.x platform. As it only provides bug-fixes, DSpace 4.1 should constitute an easy upgrade from DSpace 4.x for most users. No database changes or additional configuration changes should be necessary when upgrading from DSpace 4.x to 4.1 (except for DS-1536; see Fixing the effects of DS-1536).

Issues which have been resolved in 4.1 include:

• Fixed issue where having a period (.) in your handle prefix generated incorrect identifiers (DS-1536)
• Fixed broken quick build (from [dspace-src]/dspace) (DS-1867)
• Fixed a crash of DSpace during CSV import via BTE (DS-1857)
• Fixed collection harvesting to DSpace via ORE (DS-1848)
• Fixed deposit of new items via SWORD (DS-1846)
• Fixed search hit highlighting in XMLUI (DS-1907)
• Fixed broken 'stat-initial' script (DS-1795)
• Other minor fixes. See Changes in 4.x section for a list of all fixes.

4.0 Release Notes

The following is a list of the new features included for the 4.x platform (not an exhaustive list):

A full list of all changes / bug fixes in 4.x is available in the Changes in 4.x section.

The following individuals have contributed directly to this release of DSpace:  Adan Roman, Alan Orth, Alexey Maslov, Àlex Magaz Graça, Andrea Bollini, Andrea Schweer, Andrew Waterman, Anja Le Blanc, Bavo Van Geit (@mire), Bram Luyten (@mire), Brian Freels-Stendel, Cedric Devaux, Christian Scheible, Christos Rodosthenous, Claudia Jürgen, Clint Bellanger, Denis Fdz, DSpace @ Lyncode, Elias Tzoc, Fabio Bolognesi, Hardy Pottinger, Hélder Silva, Hilton Gibson, Ian Boston, Ivan Masár, james bardin, James Halliday, Jason Sherman, João Melo, Jonathan Blood, Jose Blanco, Juan Corrales Correyero, Keiji Suzuki, Kevin Van de Velde, Kim Shepherd, Kostas Maistrelis, Kostas Stamatis, LifeH2O, Luigi Andrea Pascarelli, Marco Fabiani, Marco Weiss, Marina Muilwijk, Mark Diggory, Mark H. Wood, Michael White, Moises A., Moises Alvarez, Onivaldo Rosa Junior, Pascal-Nicolas Becker, Peter Dietz, Rania Stathopoulou, Raul Ruiz, Richard Jones, Richard Rodgers, Robert Ruiz, Robin Taylor, Roeland Dillen, Samuel Ottenhoff, Sara Amato, Sean Carte, Stuart Lewis, Terry Brady, Thomas Autry, Thomas Misilo, Tiago Murakami, Tim Donohue, Toni Prieto, usha sharma, and others who reviewed and commented on their work.  Many of these could not do this work without the support (release time and financial) of their associated institutions. We offer thanks to those institutions for supporting their staff to take time to contribute to the DSpace project.

A big thank you also goes out to the DSpace Community Advisory Team (DCAT), who helped the developers to prioritize and plan out several of the new features that made it into this release. The current DCAT members include: Amy Lana, Augustine Gitonga, Bram Luyten, Ciarán Walsh, Claire Bundy, Dibyendra Hyoju, Elena Feinstein, Elin Stangeland, Iryna Kuchma, Jim Ottaviani, Leonie Hayes, Maureen Walsh, Michael Guthrie, Sarah Molloy, Sarah Shreeves, Sue Kunda, Valorie Hollister and Yan Han.

We apologize to any contributor accidentally left off this list. DSpace has such a large, active development community that we sometimes lose track of all our contributors. Our ongoing list of all known people/institutions that have contributed to DSpace software can be found on our DSpace Contributors page. Acknowledgments to those left off will be made in future releases.

Want to see your name appear in our list of contributors? All you have to do is report an issue, fix a bug, improve our documentation or help us determine the necessary requirements for a new feature! Visit our Issue Tracker to report a bug, or join dspace-devel mailing list to take part in development work. If you'd like to help improve our current documentation, please get in touch with one of our Committers with your ideas. You don't even need to be a developer! Repository managers can also get involved by volunteering to join the DSpace Community Advisory Team and helping our developers to plan new features.

The Release Team consisted of Mark H. Wood, Hardy Pottinger and Andrea Bollini.

Additional thanks to Tim Donohue from DuraSpace for keeping all of us focused on the work at hand, for calming us when we got excited, and for the general support for the DSpace project.