USN-5114-1: Linux kernel vulnerabilities

22 October 2021

Several security issues were fixed in the Linux kernel.

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

It was discovered that a race condition existed in the Atheros Ath9k WiFi
driver in the Linux kernel. An attacker could possibly use this to expose
sensitive information (WiFi network traffic). (CVE-2020-3702)

It was discovered that the KVM hypervisor implementation in the Linux
kernel did not properly compute the access permissions for shadow pages in
some situations. A local attacker could use this to cause a denial of
service. (CVE-2021-38198)

It was discovered that the ext4 file system in the Linux kernel contained a
race condition when writing xattrs to an inode. A local attacker could use
this to cause a denial of service or possibly gain administrative
privileges. (CVE-2021-40490)

It was discovered that the 6pack network protocol driver in the Linux
kernel did not properly perform validation checks. A privileged attacker
could use this to cause a denial of service (system crash) or execute
arbitrary code. (CVE-2021-42008)

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 18.04
Ubuntu 16.04
Ubuntu 14.04

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.
Unless you manually uninstalled the standard kernel metapackages
(e.g. linux-generic, linux-generic-lts-RELEASE, linux-virtual,
linux-powerpc), a standard system upgrade will automatically perform
this as well.

References

Related notices

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