Patch takes a patch file containing a difference listing produced by the diff program and applies those differences to one or more original files, producing patched versions.
Due to a flaw in Patch, the application can enter an infinite loop when processing a specially crafted diff file.
A local attacker could pass a specially crafted diff file to Patch, possibly resulting in a Denial of Service condition.
There is no known workaround at this time.
All patch users should upgrade to the latest version:
# emerge --sync
# emerge --ask --oneshot --verbose ">=sys-devel/patch-2.7.4"