Sendmail before 8.12.1 does not properly drop privileges when the -C option is used to load custom configuration files, which allows local users to gain privileges via malformed arguments in the configuration file whose names contain characters with the high bit set, such as (1) macro names that are one character long, (2) a variable setting which is processed by the setoption function, or (3) a Modifiers setting which is processed by the getmodifiers function.

References

• https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2001-0713
• http://razor.bindview.com/publish/advisories/adv_sm812.html
• http://www.iss.net/security_center/static/7192.php
• http://www.securityfocus.com/bid/3377