Chapter 3. Updated Packages

Updated acroread packages that disable the Adobe Reader web browser plug-in are now available for Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5 and 6 Supplementary.

Adobe Reader allows users to view and print documents in Portable Document Format (PDF). Adobe Reader 9 reached the end of its support cycle on June 26, 2013, and will not receive any more security updates. Future versions of Adobe Acrobat Reader will not be available with Red Hat Enterprise Linux.

The Adobe Reader packages in the Red Hat Network (RHN) channels will continue to be available. Red Hat will continue to provide these packages only as a courtesy to customers. Red Hat will not provide updates to the Adobe Reader packages.

This update disables the Adobe Reader web browser plug-in, which is available via the acroread-plugin package, to prevent the exploitation of security issues without user interaction when a user visits a malicious web page.

Red Hat advises users to reconsider further use of Adobe Reader for Linux, as it may contain known, unpatched security issues. Alternative PDF rendering software, such as Evince and KPDF (part of the kdegraphics package) in Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5, or Evince and Okular (part of the kdegraphics package) in Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6, should be considered. These packages will continue to receive security fixes.

Red Hat will no longer provide security updates to these packages and recommends that customers not use this application on Red Hat Enterprise Linux effective immediately.