14 DAY TRIAL // Ubuntu 14.10, Ubuntu 14.04 LTS, and Ubuntu 12.04 LTS have been updated in order to fix a couple of RPM vulnerabilities that were identified.
The RPM (package manager for RPM) exploits are not scary, but users should upgrade their systems nonetheless.
"Florian Weimer discovered that RPM incorrectly handled certain CPIO headers. If a user or automated system were tricked into installing a malicious package file, a remote attacker could use this issue to cause RPM to crash, resulting in a denial of service, or possibly execute arbitrary code," the official notification reads.
Also, "Florian Weimer discovered that RPM incorrectly handled temporary files. A local attacker could use this issue to execute arbitrary code."
These are the problems that have been identified and corrected in Ubuntu OSes. For a more detailed description of the problems, you can see Canonical's security notification. Users have been advised to upgrade their systems as soon as possible.
In general, a standard system update will make all the necessary changes and you don't have to restart the PC in order to complete the update.
You can also use the terminal to update the system. Just enter these commands in a terminal near you:
sudo apt-get dist-upgrade