+- [CVE-2004-0966](http://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?name=CVE-2004-0966),
+ *i.e.* [Debian bug #278283](http://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/bugreport.cgi?bug=278283):
+ the autopoint and gettextize scripts in the GNU gettext package
+ 1.14 and later versions, as used in Trustix Secure Linux 1.5
+ through 2.1 and other operating systems, allows local users to
+ overwrite files via a symlink attack on temporary files.
+- [CVE-2007-4462](http://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?name=CVE-2007-4462):
+ `lib/Locale/Po4a/Po.pm` in po4a before 0.32 allows local users to
+ overwrite arbitrary files via a symlink attack on the
+ gettextization.failed.po temporary file.
+
+**FIXME**: check whether this plugin would have been a possible attack
+vector to exploit these vulnerabilities.
+
+Depending on my mood, the lack of found security issues can either
+indicate that there are none, or reveal that no-one ever bothered to
+find (and publish) them.
+
+### PO file features
+
+Can any sort of directives be put in po files that will cause mischief
+(ie, include other files, run commands, crash gettext, whatever)?
+
+> No [documented](http://www.gnu.org/software/gettext/manual/gettext.html#PO-Files)
+> directive is supposed to do so. [[--intrigeri]]
+
+### Running po4a on untrusted content
+
+Are there any security issues on running po4a on untrusted content?
+
+To say the least, this issue is not well covered, at least publicly:
+
+- the documentation does not talk about it;
+- grep'ing the source code for `security` or `trust` gives no answer.
+
+On the other hand, a po4a developer answered my questions in
+a convincing manner, stating that processing untrusted content was not
+an initial goal, and analysing in detail the possible issues.
+
+#### Already checked
+
+- the core (`Po.pm`, `Transtractor.pm`) should be safe
+- po4a source code was fully checked for other potential symlink
+ attacks, after discovery of one such issue
+- the only external program run by the core is `diff`, in `Po.pm` (in
+ parts of its code we don't use)
+- `Locale::gettext`: only used to display translated error messages
+- Nicolas François "hopes" `DynaLoader` is safe, and has "no reason to
+ think that `Encode` is not safe"
+- Nicolas François has "no reason to think that `Encode::Guess` is not
+ safe". The po plugin nevertheless avoids using it by defining the
+ input charset (`file_in_charset`) before asking `Transtractor` to
+ read any file. NB: this hack depends on po4a internals to stay
+ the same.
+
+#### To be checked
+
+##### Locale::Po4a modules
+
+- the modules we want to use have to be checked, as not all are safe
+ (e.g. the LaTeX module's behaviour is changed by commands included
+ in the content); they may use regexps generated from the content; we
+ currently only use the `Text` module
+- the `Text` module does not run any external program
+- check that no module is loaded by `Chooser.pm`, when we tell it to
+ load the `Text` one
+- `nsgmls` is used by `Sgml.pm`