Updated kernel packages that resolve several security issues and fix various bugs are now available for Red Hat Enterprise Linux 4.

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

The kernel packages contain the Linux kernel, the core of any Linux operating system.

This update addresses the following security issues :

* the sendmsg() function in the Linux kernel did not block during UNIX socket garbage collection. This could, potentially, lead to a local denial of service. (CVE-2008-5300, Important)

* when fput() was called to close a socket, the __scm_destroy() function in the Linux kernel could make indirect recursive calls to itself. This could, potentially, lead to a local denial of service.
(CVE-2008-5029, Important)

* a deficiency was found in the Linux kernel virtual file system (VFS) implementation. This could allow a local, unprivileged user to make a series of file creations within deleted directories, possibly causing a denial of service. (CVE-2008-3275, Moderate)

* a buffer underflow flaw was found in the Linux kernel IB700 SBC watchdog timer driver. This deficiency could lead to a possible information leak. By default, the '/dev/watchdog' device is accessible only to the root user. (CVE-2008-5702, Low)

* the hfs and hfsplus file systems code failed to properly handle corrupted data structures. This could, potentially, lead to a local denial of service. (CVE-2008-4933, CVE-2008-5025, Low)

* a flaw was found in the hfsplus file system implementation. This could, potentially, lead to a local denial of service when write operations were performed. (CVE-2008-4934, Low)

This update also fixes the following bugs :

* when running Red Hat Enterprise Linux 4.6 and 4.7 on some systems running Intel(r) CPUs, the cpuspeed daemon did not run, preventing the CPU speed from being changed, such as not being reduced to an idle state when not in use.

* mmap() could be used to gain access to beyond the first megabyte of RAM, due to insufficient checks in the Linux kernel code. Checks have been added to prevent this.

* attempting to turn keyboard LEDs on and off rapidly on keyboards with slow keyboard controllers, may have caused key presses to fail.

* after migrating a hypervisor guest, the MAC address table was not updated, causing packet loss and preventing network connections to the guest. Now, a gratuitous ARP request is sent after migration. This refreshes the ARP caches, minimizing network downtime.

* writing crash dumps with diskdump may have caused a kernel panic on Non-Uniform Memory Access (NUMA) systems with certain memory configurations.

* on big-endian systems, such as PowerPC, the getsockopt() function incorrectly returned 0 depending on the parameters passed to it when the time to live (TTL) value equaled 255, possibly causing memory corruption and application crashes.

* a problem in the kernel packages provided by the RHSA-2008:0508 advisory caused the Linux kernel's built-in memory copy procedure to return the wrong error code after recovering from a page fault on AMD64 and Intel 64 systems. This may have caused other Linux kernel functions to return wrong error codes.

* a divide-by-zero bug in the Linux kernel process scheduler, which may have caused kernel panics on certain systems, has been resolved.

* the netconsole kernel module caused the Linux kernel to hang when slave interfaces of bonded network interfaces were started, resulting in a system hang or kernel panic when restarting the network.

* the '/proc/xen/' directory existed even if systems were not running Red Hat Virtualization. This may have caused problems for third-party software that checks virtualization-ability based on the existence of '/proc/xen/'. Note: this update will remove the '/proc/xen/' directory on systems not running Red Hat Virtualization.

All Red Hat Enterprise Linux 4 users should upgrade to these updated packages, which contain backported patches to resolve these issues.

This update addresses the following security issues :

  - the sendmsg() function in the Linux kernel did not block     during UNIX socket garbage collection. This could,     potentially, lead to a local denial of service.
    (CVE-2008-5300, Important)

  - when fput() was called to close a socket, the
    __scm_destroy() function in the Linux kernel could make     indirect recursive calls to itself. This could,     potentially, lead to a local denial of service.
    (CVE-2008-5029, Important)

  - a deficiency was found in the Linux kernel virtual file     system (VFS) implementation. This could allow a local,     unprivileged user to make a series of file creations     within deleted directories, possibly causing a denial of     service. (CVE-2008-3275, Moderate)

  - a buffer underflow flaw was found in the Linux kernel     IB700 SBC watchdog timer driver. This deficiency could     lead to a possible information leak. By default, the     '/dev/watchdog' device is accessible only to the root     user. (CVE-2008-5702, Low)

  - the hfs and hfsplus file systems code failed to properly     handle corrupted data structures. This could,     potentially, lead to a local denial of service.
    (CVE-2008-4933, CVE-2008-5025, Low)

  - a flaw was found in the hfsplus file system     implementation. This could, potentially, lead to a local     denial of service when write operations were performed.
    (CVE-2008-4934, Low)

This update also fixes the following bugs :

  - when running Red Hat Enterprise Linux 4.6 and 4.7 on     some systems running Intel&reg; CPUs, the cpuspeed     daemon did not run, preventing the CPU speed from being     changed, such as not being reduced to an idle state when     not in use.

  - mmap() could be used to gain access to beyond the first     megabyte of RAM, due to insufficient checks in the Linux     kernel code. Checks have been added to prevent this.

  - attempting to turn keyboard LEDs on and off rapidly on     keyboards with slow keyboard controllers, may have     caused key presses to fail.

  - after migrating a hypervisor guest, the MAC address     table was not updated, causing packet loss and     preventing network connections to the guest. Now, a     gratuitous ARP request is sent after migration. This     refreshes the ARP caches, minimizing network downtime.

  - writing crash dumps with diskdump may have caused a     kernel panic on Non-Uniform Memory Access (NUMA) systems     with certain memory configurations.

  - on big-endian systems, such as PowerPC, the getsockopt()     function incorrectly returned 0 depending on the     parameters passed to it when the time to live (TTL)     value equaled 255, possibly causing memory corruption     and application crashes.

  - a problem in the kernel packages provided by the     RHSA-2008:0508 advisory caused the Linux kernel's     built-in memory copy procedure to return the wrong error     code after recovering from a page fault on AMD64 and     Intel 64 systems. This may have caused other Linux     kernel functions to return wrong error codes.

  - a divide-by-zero bug in the Linux kernel process     scheduler, which may have caused kernel panics on     certain systems, has been resolved.

  - the netconsole kernel module caused the Linux kernel to     hang when slave interfaces of bonded network interfaces     were started, resulting in a system hang or kernel panic     when restarting the network.

  - the '/proc/xen/' directory existed even if systems were     not running Red Hat Virtualization. This may have caused     problems for third-party software that checks     virtualization-ability based on the existence of     '/proc/xen/'. Note: this update will remove the     '/proc/xen/' directory on systems not running Red Hat     Virtualization.

This updated kernel-utils package adds an enhancement in the way of proper support for user-space frequency-scaling on multi-core systems.

Updated kernel packages that fix several security issues and multiple bugs are now available for Red Hat Enterprise Linux 3.

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

The kernel packages contain the Linux kernel, the core of any Linux operating system.

Security fixes :

* when fput() was called to close a socket, the __scm_destroy() function in the Linux kernel could make indirect recursive calls to itself. This could, potentially, lead to a denial of service issue.
(CVE-2008-5029, Important)

* the sendmsg() function in the Linux kernel did not block during UNIX socket garbage collection. This could, potentially, lead to a local denial of service. (CVE-2008-5300, Important)

* the exit_notify() function in the Linux kernel did not properly reset the exit signal if a process executed a set user ID (setuid) application before exiting. This could allow a local, unprivileged user to elevate their privileges. (CVE-2009-1337, Important)

* a flaw was found in the Intel PRO/1000 network driver in the Linux kernel. Frames with sizes near the MTU of an interface may be split across multiple hardware receive descriptors. Receipt of such a frame could leak through a validation check, leading to a corruption of the length check. A remote attacker could use this flaw to send a specially crafted packet that would cause a denial of service or code execution. (CVE-2009-1385, Important)

* the ADDR_COMPAT_LAYOUT and MMAP_PAGE_ZERO flags were not cleared when a setuid or setgid program was executed. A local, unprivileged user could use this flaw to bypass the mmap_min_addr protection mechanism and perform a NULL pointer dereference attack, or bypass the Address Space Layout Randomization (ASLR) security feature.
(CVE-2009-1895, Important)

* it was discovered that, when executing a new process, the clear_child_tid pointer in the Linux kernel is not cleared. If this pointer points to a writable portion of the memory of the new program, the kernel could corrupt four bytes of memory, possibly leading to a local denial of service or privilege escalation. (CVE-2009-2848, Important)

* missing initialization flaws were found in getname() implementations in the IrDA sockets, AppleTalk DDP protocol, NET/ROM protocol, and ROSE protocol implementations in the Linux kernel. Certain data structures in these getname() implementations were not initialized properly before being copied to user-space. These flaws could lead to an information leak. (CVE-2009-3002, Important)

* a NULL pointer dereference flaw was found in each of the following functions in the Linux kernel: pipe_read_open(), pipe_write_open(), and pipe_rdwr_open(). When the mutex lock is not held, the i_pipe pointer could be released by other processes before it is used to update the pipe's reader and writer counters. This could lead to a local denial of service or privilege escalation. (CVE-2009-3547, Important)

Bug fixes :

* this update adds the mmap_min_addr tunable and restriction checks to help prevent unprivileged users from creating new memory mappings below the minimum address. This can help prevent the exploitation of NULL pointer dereference bugs. Note that mmap_min_addr is set to zero (disabled) by default for backwards compatibility. (BZ#512642)

* a bridge reference count problem in IPv6 has been fixed. (BZ#457010)

* enforce null-termination of user-supplied arguments to setsockopt().
(BZ#505514)

* the gcc flag '-fno-delete-null-pointer-checks' was added to the kernel build options. This prevents gcc from optimizing out NULL pointer checks after the first use of a pointer. NULL pointer bugs are often exploited by attackers. Keeping these checks is a safety measure. (BZ#511185)

* a check has been added to the IPv4 code to make sure that rt is not NULL, to help prevent future bugs in functions that call ip_append_data() from being exploitable. (BZ#520300)

Users should upgrade to these updated packages, which contain backported patches to correct these issues. The system must be rebooted for this update to take effect.

The remote MiracleLinux 3 host has packages installed that are affected by multiple vulnerabilities as referenced in the AXSA:2009-22:03 advisory.

    The kernel package contains the Linux kernel (vmlinuz), the core of any Linux operating system. The kernel     handles the basic functions of the operating system: memory allocation, process allocation, device input     and output, etc.
    Bugs fixed:
    CVE-2008-5029     The __scm_destroy function in net/core/scm.c in the Linux kernel 2.6.27.4, 2.6.26, and earlier makes     indirect recursive calls to itself through calls to the fput function, which allows local users to cause a     denial of service (panic) via vectors related to sending an SCM_RIGHTS message through a UNIX domain     socket and closing file descriptors.
    CVE-2008-5079     net/atm/svc.c in the ATM subsystem in the Linux kernel 2.6.27.8 and earlier allows local users to cause a     denial of service (kernel infinite loop) by making two calls to svc_listen for the same socket, and then     reading a /proc/net/atm/*vc file, related to corruption of the vcc table.
    CVE-2008-5182     The inotify functionality in Linux kernel 2.6 before 2.6.28-rc5 might allow local users to gain privileges     via unknown vectors related to race conditions in inotify watch removal and umount.
    CVE-2008-4933     Buffer overflow in the hfsplus_find_cat function in fs/hfsplus/catalog.c in the Linux kernel before     2.6.28-rc1 allows attackers to cause a denial of service (memory corruption or system crash) via an     hfsplus filesystem image with an invalid catalog namelength field, related to the     hfsplus_cat_build_key_uni function.
    CVE-2008-4934     The hfsplus_block_allocate function in fs/hfsplus/bitmap.c in the Linux kernel before 2.6.28-rc1 does not     check a certain return value from the read_mapping_page function before calling kmap, which allows     attackers to cause a denial of service (system crash) via a crafted hfsplus filesystem image.
    CVE-2008-5025     Stack-based buffer overflow in the hfs_cat_find_brec function in fs/hfs/catalog.c in the Linux kernel     before 2.6.28-rc1 allows attackers to cause a denial of service (memory corruption or system crash) via an     hfs filesystem image with an invalid catalog namelength field, a related issue to CVE-2008-4933.
    CVE-2008-5713     The __qdisc_run function in net/sched/sch_generic.c in the Linux kernel before 2.6.25 on SMP machines     allows local users to cause a denial of service (soft lockup) by sending a large amount of network     traffic, as demonstrated by multiple simultaneous invocations of the Netperf benchmark application in     UDP_STREAM mode.
    CVE-2009-0031     Memory leak in the keyctl_join_session_keyring function (security/keys/keyctl.c) in Linux kernel     2.6.29-rc2 and earlier allows local users to cause a denial of service (kernel memory consumption) via     unknown vectors related to a missing kfree.
    CVE-2009-0065     Buffer overflow in net/sctp/sm_statefuns.c in the Stream Control Transmission Protocol (sctp)     implementation in the Linux kernel before 2.6.28-git8 allows remote attackers to have an unknown impact     via an FWD-TSN (aka FORWARD-TSN) chunk with a large stream ID.
    Other bugs:
    [IPv6] Fix source address/interface selection.
    When bonding two e1000 NIC(eth0, eth1) into one bonding device (bond0) and using the command ping6 -I     specifying bond0 global address, the ping6 packet is sent as from eth0 and bond0 does not receive the     reply packet.
    VLAN devices 'features' were not set adequately, resulting in possible performance loss (seen on NIC e1000     with TSO capability)     Support for Nehalem-EP C6 state (power saving feature).

Tenable has extracted the preceding description block directly from the MiracleLinux security advisory.

Note that Nessus has not tested for these issues but has instead relied only on the application's self-reported version number.

This update fixes various security issues and several bugs in the openSUSE 11.0 kernel. It was also updated to the stable version 2.6.25.20.

CVE-2008-5702: Buffer underflow in the ibwdt_ioctl function in drivers/watchdog/ib700wdt.c might allow local users to have an unknown impact via a certain /dev/watchdog WDIOC_SETTIMEOUT IOCTL call.

CVE-2008-5700: libata did not set minimum timeouts for SG_IO requests, which allows local users to cause a denial of service (Programmed I/O mode on drives) via multiple simultaneous invocations of an unspecified test program.

CVE-2008-5079: net/atm/svc.c in the ATM subsystem allowed local users to cause a denial of service (kernel infinite loop) by making two calls to svc_listen for the same socket, and then reading a /proc/net/atm/*vc file, related to corruption of the vcc table.

CVE-2008-5300: Linux kernel 2.6.28 allows local users to cause a denial of service ('soft lockup' and process loss) via a large number of sendmsg function calls, which does not block during AF_UNIX garbage collection and triggers an OOM condition, a different vulnerability than CVE-2008-5029.

CVE-2008-5029: The __scm_destroy function in net/core/scm.c makes indirect recursive calls to itself through calls to the fput function, which allows local users to cause a denial of service (panic) via vectors related to sending an SCM_RIGHTS message through a UNIX domain socket and closing file descriptors.

CVE-2008-4933: Buffer overflow in the hfsplus_find_cat function in fs/hfsplus/catalog.c allowed attackers to cause a denial of service (memory corruption or system crash) via an hfsplus filesystem image with an invalid catalog namelength field, related to the hfsplus_cat_build_key_uni function.

CVE-2008-5025: Stack-based buffer overflow in the hfs_cat_find_brec function in fs/hfs/catalog.c allowed attackers to cause a denial of service (memory corruption or system crash) via an hfs filesystem image with an invalid catalog namelength field, a related issue to CVE-2008-4933.

CVE-2008-5182: The inotify functionality might allow local users to gain privileges via unknown vectors related to race conditions in inotify watch removal and umount.

CVE-2008-3831: The i915 driver in drivers/char/drm/i915_dma.c does not restrict the DRM_I915_HWS_ADDR ioctl to the Direct Rendering Manager (DRM) master, which allows local users to cause a denial of service (memory corruption) via a crafted ioctl call, related to absence of the DRM_MASTER and DRM_ROOT_ONLY flags in the ioctl's configuration.

CVE-2008-4554: The do_splice_from function in fs/splice.c did not reject file descriptors that have the O_APPEND flag set, which allows local users to bypass append mode and make arbitrary changes to other locations in the file.

The SUSE Linux Enterprise 10 Service Pack 2 kernel was updated to fix some security issues and various bugs.

The following security problems have been fixed :

  - net/atm/svc.c in the ATM subsystem allowed local users     to cause a denial of service (kernel infinite loop) by     making two calls to svc_listen for the same socket, and     then reading a /proc/net/atm/ *vc file, related to     corruption of the vcc table. (CVE-2008-5079)

  - The __scm_destroy function in net/core/scm.c makes     indirect recursive calls to itself through calls to the     fput function, which allows local users to cause a     denial of service (panic) via vectors related to sending     an SCM_RIGHTS message through a UNIX domain socket and     closing file descriptors. (CVE-2008-5029)

  - Buffer overflow in the hfsplus_find_cat function in     fs/hfsplus/catalog.c allowed attackers to cause a denial     of service (memory corruption or system crash) via an     hfsplus filesystem image with an invalid catalog     namelength field, related to the     hfsplus_cat_build_key_uni function. (CVE-2008-4933)

  - Stack-based buffer overflow in the hfs_cat_find_brec     function in fs/hfs/catalog.c allowed attackers to cause     a denial of service (memory corruption or system crash)     via an hfs filesystem image with an invalid catalog     namelength field, a related issue to CVE-2008-4933.
    (CVE-2008-5025)

  - The inotify functionality might allow local users to     gain privileges via unknown vectors related to race     conditions in inotify watch removal and umount.
    (CVE-2008-5182)

A lot of other bugs were fixed, a detailed list can be found in the RPM changelog.

ID	Name	Product	Family	Published	Updated	Severity
43727	CentOS 4 : kernel (CESA-2009:0014)	Nessus	CentOS Local Security Checks	1/6/2010	1/4/2021	high
60520	Scientific Linux Security Update : kernel on SL4.x i386/x86_64	Nessus	Scientific Linux Local Security Checks	8/1/2012	1/14/2021	high
67070	CentOS 3 : kernel (CESA-2009:1550)	Nessus	CentOS Local Security Checks	6/29/2013	1/4/2021	high
284420	MiracleLinux 3 : kernel-2.6.18-53.21AXS3 (AXSA:2009-22:03)	Nessus	Miracle Linux Local Security Checks	1/14/2026	2/12/2026	medium
40011	openSUSE Security Update : kernel (kernel-423)	Nessus	SuSE Local Security Checks	7/21/2009	1/14/2021	high
41537	SuSE 10 Security Update : Linux kernel (ZYPP Patch Number 5924)	Nessus	SuSE Local Security Checks	9/24/2009	1/14/2021	high

Detections

Analytics

Plugins Search

high

high

high

medium

high

high