Synopsis
The remote Debian host is missing a security-related update.
Description
A vulnerability has been discovered in the Linux kernel that may lead to privilege escalation. The Common Vulnerabilities and Exposures project identifies the following problem :
- CVE-2009-2692 Tavis Ormandy and Julien Tinnes discovered an issue with how the sendpage function is initialized in the proto_ops structure. Local users can exploit this vulnerability to gain elevated privileges.
Solution
Upgrade the linux-2.6.24 packages.
For the oldstable distribution (etch), this problem has been fixed in version 2.6.24-6~etchnhalf.8etch3.
Note: Debian 'etch' includes linux kernel packages based upon both the 2.6.18 and 2.6.24 linux releases. All known security issues are carefully tracked against both packages and both packages will receive security updates until security support for Debian 'etch' concludes.
However, given the high frequency at which low-severity security issues are discovered in the kernel and the resource requirements of doing an update, lower severity 2.6.18 and 2.6.24 updates will typically release in a staggered or 'leap-frog' fashion.