USN-966-1: Linux kernel vulnerabilities

4 August 2010

Multiple security flaws.

Reduce your security exposure

Ubuntu Pro provides ten-year security coverage to 25,000+ packages in Main and Universe repositories, and it is free for up to five machines.

Learn more about Ubuntu Pro

Releases

Packages

Details

Junjiro R. Okajima discovered that knfsd did not correctly handle
strict overcommit. A local attacker could exploit this to crash knfsd,
leading to a denial of service. (Only Ubuntu 6.06 LTS and 8.04 LTS were
affected.) (CVE-2008-7256, CVE-2010-1643)

Chris Guo, Jukka Taimisto, and Olli Jarva discovered that SCTP did
not correctly handle invalid parameters. A remote attacker could send
specially crafted traffic that could crash the system, leading to a
denial of service. (CVE-2010-1173)

Mario Mikocevic discovered that GFS2 did not correctly handle certain
quota structures. A local attacker could exploit this to crash the
system, leading to a denial of service. (Ubuntu 6.06 LTS was not
affected.) (CVE-2010-1436)

Toshiyuki Okajima discovered that the kernel keyring did not correctly
handle dead keyrings. A local attacker could exploit this to crash the
system, leading to a denial of service. (CVE-2010-1437)

Brad Spengler discovered that Sparc did not correctly implement
non-executable stacks. This made userspace applications vulnerable to
exploits that would have been otherwise blocked due to non-executable
memory protections. (Ubuntu 10.04 LTS was not affected.) (CVE-2010-1451)

Dan Rosenberg discovered that the btrfs clone function did not correctly
validate permissions. A local attacker could exploit this to read
sensitive information, leading to a loss of privacy. (Only Ubuntu 9.10
was affected.) (CVE-2010-1636)

Dan Rosenberg discovered that GFS2 set_flags function did not correctly
validate permissions. A local attacker could exploit this to gain
access to files, leading to a loss of privacy and potential privilege
escalation. (Ubuntu 6.06 LTS was not affected.) (CVE-2010-1641)

Shi Weihua discovered that btrfs xattr_set_acl function did not
correctly validate permissions. A local attacker could exploit
this to gain access to files, leading to a loss of privacy and
potential privilege escalation. (Only Ubuntu 9.10 and 10.04 LTS were
affected.) (CVE-2010-2071)

Andre Osterhues discovered that eCryptfs did not correctly calculate
hash values. A local attacker with certain uids could exploit this to
crash the system or potentially gain root privileges. (Ubuntu 6.06 LTS
was not affected.) (CVE-2010-2492)

Reduce your security exposure

Ubuntu Pro provides ten-year security coverage to 25,000+ packages in Main and Universe repositories, and it is free for up to five machines.

Learn more about Ubuntu Pro

Update instructions

The problem can be corrected by updating your system to the following package versions:

Ubuntu 9.10
Ubuntu 9.04
Ubuntu 8.04
Ubuntu 6.06
Ubuntu 10.04

After a standard system update you need to reboot your computer to make
all the necessary changes.

References

Join the discussion

Need help with your security needs?

Ubuntu Pro provides up to ten-year security coverage for over 23,000 open-source packages within the Ubuntu Main and Universe repositories.

Talk to an expert to find out what would work best for you

Further reading