Scientific Linux Security Update : kernel on SL5.x i386/x86_64 (20131205)

low Nessus Plugin ID 71305

Synopsis

The remote Scientific Linux host is missing one or more security updates.

Description

- An information leak flaw was found in the way the Xen hypervisor handled error conditions when reading guest memory during certain guest-originated operations, such as port or memory mapped I/O writes. A privileged user in a fully-virtualized guest could use this flaw to leak hypervisor stack memory to a guest. (CVE-2013-4355, Moderate)

This update also fixes the following bugs :

- A previous fix to the kernel did not contain a memory barrier in the percpu_up_write() function. Consequently, under certain circumstances, a race condition could occur leading to memory corruption and a subsequent kernel panic. This update introduces a new memory barrier pair, light_mb() and heavy_mb(), for per-CPU basis read and write semaphores (percpu-rw- semaphores) ensuring that the race condition can no longer occur. In addition, the read path performance of 'percpu-rw-semaphores' has been improved.

- Due to a bug in the tg3 driver, systems that had the Wake-on-LAN (WOL) feature enabled on their NICs could not have been woken up from suspension or hibernation using WOL. A missing pci_wake_from_d3() function call has been added to the tg3 driver, which ensures that WOL functions properly by setting the PME_ENABLE bit.

- Due to an incorrect test condition in the mpt2sas driver, the driver was unable to catch failures to map a SCSI scatter-gather list. The test condition has been corrected so that the mpt2sas driver now handles SCSI scatter-gather mapping failures as expected.

- A previous patch to the kernel introduced the 'VLAN tag re-insertion' workaround to resolve a problem with incorrectly handled VLAN-tagged packets with no assigned VLAN group while the be2net driver was in promiscuous mode. However, this solution led to packet corruption and a subsequent kernel oops if such a processed packed was a GRO packet. Therefore, a patch has been applied to restrict VLAN tag re-insertion only to non-GRO packets.
The be2net driver now processes VLAN-tagged packets with no assigned VLAN group correctly in this situation.

The system must be rebooted for this update to take effect.

Solution

Update the affected packages.

See Also

http://www.nessus.org/u?88da9bb2

Plugin Details

Severity: Low

ID: 71305

File Name: sl_20131205_kernel_on_SL5_x.nasl

Version: 1.5

Type: local

Agent: unix

Published: 12/10/2013

Updated: 1/14/2021

Supported Sensors: Nessus Agent, Nessus

Risk Information

VPR

Risk Factor: Medium

Score: 5.9

CVSS v2

Risk Factor: Low

Base Score: 1.5

Vector: CVSS2#AV:L/AC:M/Au:S/C:P/I:N/A:N

Vulnerability Information

CPE: p-cpe:/a:fermilab:scientific_linux:kernel, p-cpe:/a:fermilab:scientific_linux:kernel-pae, p-cpe:/a:fermilab:scientific_linux:kernel-pae-debuginfo, p-cpe:/a:fermilab:scientific_linux:kernel-pae-devel, p-cpe:/a:fermilab:scientific_linux:kernel-debug, p-cpe:/a:fermilab:scientific_linux:kernel-debug-debuginfo, p-cpe:/a:fermilab:scientific_linux:kernel-debug-devel, p-cpe:/a:fermilab:scientific_linux:kernel-debuginfo, p-cpe:/a:fermilab:scientific_linux:kernel-debuginfo-common, p-cpe:/a:fermilab:scientific_linux:kernel-devel, p-cpe:/a:fermilab:scientific_linux:kernel-doc, p-cpe:/a:fermilab:scientific_linux:kernel-headers, p-cpe:/a:fermilab:scientific_linux:kernel-xen, p-cpe:/a:fermilab:scientific_linux:kernel-xen-debuginfo, p-cpe:/a:fermilab:scientific_linux:kernel-xen-devel, x-cpe:/o:fermilab:scientific_linux

Required KB Items: Host/local_checks_enabled, Host/RedHat/release, Host/RedHat/rpm-list, Host/cpu

Patch Publication Date: 12/5/2013

Vulnerability Publication Date: 10/1/2013

Reference Information

CVE: CVE-2013-4355