USN-6945-1: wpa_supplicant and hostapd vulnerability

6 August 2024

wpa_supplicant could be made to run programs as an administrator with specially crafted configuration file.

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Releases

Packages

  • wpa - client support for WPA and WPA2

Details

Rory McNamara discovered that wpa_supplicant could be made to load
arbitrary shared objects by unprivileged users that have access to
the control interface. An attacker could use this to escalate privileges
to root.

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 24.04
Ubuntu 22.04
Ubuntu 20.04
Ubuntu 18.04
Ubuntu 16.04
Ubuntu 14.04

In general, a standard system update will make all the necessary changes.

References

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Further reading