SSH, as implemented in OpenSSH before 4.0 and possibly other implementations, stores hostnames, IP addresses, and keys in plaintext in the known_hosts file, which makes it easier for an attacker that has compromised an SSH user's account to generate a list of additional targets that are more likely to have the same password or key.

The installed version of OpenSSH is prior to 4.0 and is affected by an information disclosure vulnerability due to how the application stores hostnames, IP addresses, and keys in plaintext in the 'known_hosts' file. A local attacker, exploiting this flaw, could gain access to sensitive information that could be used in subsequent attacks.

From Red Hat Security Advisory 2007:0257 :

Updated openssh packages that fix a security issue and various bugs are now available.

This update has been rated as having low security impact by the Red Hat Security Response Team.

OpenSSH is OpenBSD's SSH (Secure SHell) protocol implementation. This package includes the core files necessary for both the OpenSSH client and server.

OpenSSH stores hostnames, IP addresses, and keys in plaintext in the known_hosts file. A local attacker that has already compromised a user's SSH account could use this information to generate a list of additional targets that are likely to have the same password or key.
(CVE-2005-2666)

The following bugs have also been fixed in this update :

* The ssh client could abort the running connection when the server application generated a large output at once.

* When 'X11UseLocalhost' option was set to 'no' on systems with IPv6 networking enabled, the X11 forwarding socket listened only for IPv6 connections.

* When the privilege separation was enabled in /etc/ssh/sshd_config, some log messages in the system log were duplicated and also had timestamps from an incorrect timezone.

All users of openssh should upgrade to these updated packages, which contain backported patches to correct these issues.

Updated openssh packages that fix a security issue and various bugs are now available.

This update has been rated as having low security impact by the Red Hat Security Response Team.

OpenSSH is OpenBSD's SSH (Secure SHell) protocol implementation. This package includes the core files necessary for both the OpenSSH client and server.

OpenSSH stores hostnames, IP addresses, and keys in plaintext in the known_hosts file. A local attacker that has already compromised a user's SSH account could use this information to generate a list of additional targets that are likely to have the same password or key.
(CVE-2005-2666)

The following bugs have also been fixed in this update :

* The ssh client could abort the running connection when the server application generated a large output at once.

* When 'X11UseLocalhost' option was set to 'no' on systems with IPv6 networking enabled, the X11 forwarding socket listened only for IPv6 connections.

* When the privilege separation was enabled in /etc/ssh/sshd_config, some log messages in the system log were duplicated and also had timestamps from an incorrect timezone.

All users of openssh should upgrade to these updated packages, which contain backported patches to correct these issues.

OpenSSH stores hostnames, IP addresses, and keys in plaintext in the known_hosts file. A local attacker that has already compromised a user's SSH account could use this information to generate a list of additional targets that are likely to have the same password or key.
(CVE-2005-2666)

According to its banner, the remote host is running a version of OpenSSH prior to 4.0.  Versions of OpenSSH earlier than 4.0 are affected by an information disclosure vulnerability because the application stores hostnames, IP addresses, and keys in plaintext in the 'known_hosts' file.  A local attacker, exploiting this flaw, could gain access to sensitive information that could be used in subsequent attacks.

The version of SunSSH running on the remote host has an information disclosure vulnerability.  A design flaw in the SSH specification could allow a man-in-the-middle attacker to recover up to 32 bits of plaintext from an SSH-protected connection in the standard configuration.  An attacker could exploit this to gain access to sensitive information.

Note that this version of SunSSH is also prone to several additional issues but Nessus did not test for them.

ID	Name	Product	Family	Severity
701167	OpenSSH < 4.0 Information Disclosure	Nessus Network Monitor	SSH	low
67481	Oracle Linux 4 : openssh (ELSA-2007-0257)	Nessus	Oracle Linux Local Security Checks	low
67047	CentOS 4 : openssh (CESA-2007:0257)	Nessus	CentOS Local Security Checks	low
60168	Scientific Linux Security Update : openssh on SL4.x i386/x86_64	Nessus	Scientific Linux Local Security Checks	low
44075	OpenSSH < 4.0 known_hosts Plaintext Host Information Disclosure	Nessus	Misc.	low
55992	SunSSH < 1.1.1 / 1.3 CBC Plaintext Disclosure	Nessus	Misc.	critical
25143	RHEL 4 : openssh (RHSA-2007:0257)	Nessus	Red Hat Local Security Checks	low

Detections

Analytics

CVE-2005-2666

critical

Tenable Plugins

low

low

low

low

low

critical

low