USN-2491-1: Linux kernel (EC2) vulnerabilities
4 February 2015
Several security issues were fixed in the kernel.
Releases
Packages
- linux-ec2 - Linux kernel for EC2
Details
Andy Lutomirski discovered that the Linux kernel does not properly handle
faults associated with the Stack Segment (SS) register in the x86
architecture. A local attacker could exploit this flaw to gain
administrative privileges. (CVE-2014-9322)
Lars Bull reported a race condition in the PIT (programmable interrupt
timer) emulation in the KVM (Kernel Virtual Machine) subsystem of the Linux
kernel. A local guest user with access to PIT i/o ports could exploit this
flaw to cause a denial of service (crash) on the host. (CVE-2014-3611)
Lars Bull and Nadav Amit reported a flaw in how KVM (the Kernel Virtual
Machine) handles noncanonical writes to certain MSR registers. A privileged
guest user can exploit this flaw to cause a denial of service (kernel
panic) on the host. (CVE-2014-3610)
Andy Lutomirski discovered an information leak in the Linux kernel's Thread
Local Storage (TLS) implementation allowing users to bypass the espfix to
obtain information that could be used to bypass the Address Space Layout
Randomization (ASLR) protection mechanism. A local user could exploit this
flaw to obtain potentially sensitive information from kernel memory.
(CVE-2014-8133)
Prasad J Pandit reported a flaw in the rock_continue function of the Linux
kernel's ISO 9660 CDROM file system. A local user could exploit this flaw
to cause a denial of service (system crash or hang). (CVE-2014-9420)
Update instructions
The problem can be corrected by updating your system to the following package versions:
Ubuntu 10.04
After a standard system update you need to reboot your computer to make
all the necessary changes.
ATTENTION: Due to an unavoidable ABI change the kernel updates have
been given a new version number, which requires you to recompile and
reinstall all third party kernel modules you might have installed. If
you use linux-restricted-modules, you have to update that package as
well to get modules which work with the new kernel version. Unless you
manually uninstalled the standard kernel metapackages (e.g. linux-generic,
linux-server, linux-powerpc), a standard system upgrade will automatically
perform this as well.