From agent99@csd.sgi.com Tue Aug 15 00:05:15 2000 From: SGI Security Coordinator Resent-From: mea culpa To: agent99@sgi.com Resent-To: jericho@attrition.org Date: Mon, 14 Aug 2000 16:56:31 -0700 (PDT) Subject: Linux Kernel Capability Vulnerability -----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- ______________________________________________________________________________ SGI Security Advisory Title: Linux Kernel Capability Vulnerability Number: 20000802-01-P Date: August 14, 2000 ______________________________________________________________________________ SGI provides this information freely to the SGI user community for its consideration, interpretation, implementation and use. SGI recommends that this information be acted upon as soon as possible. SGI provides the information in this Security Advisory on an "AS-IS" basis only, and disclaims all warranties with respect thereto, express, implied or otherwise, including, without limitation, any warranty of merchantability or fitness for a particular purpose. In no event shall SGI be liable for any loss of profits, loss of business, loss of data or for any indirect, special, exemplary, incidental or consequential damages of any kind arising from your use of, failure to use or improper use of any of the instructions or information in this Security Advisory. ______________________________________________________________________________ - ----------------------- - --- Issue Specifics --- - ----------------------- Sendmail, Inc. (http://www.sendmail.com/) reported a vulnerability in the capability model of the Linux kernel which can lead to a root compromise. SGI ProPack for Linux uses a modified kernel optimized for SGI Linux hardware. This kernel is based on the standard kernel available from http://www.kernel.org/ with SGI patches from http://oss.sgi.com/ SGI has investigated the issue and recommends the following steps for neutralizing the exposure. It is HIGHLY RECOMMENDED that these measures be implemented on ALL vulnerable SGI systems. This issue will be corrected in future releases of SGI ProPack for Linux. - -------------- - --- Impact --- - -------------- SGI ProPack for Linux comes with a modified Linux kernel and is installed by default on various Linux distributions. For more information, see: http://oss.sgi.com/projects/ or http://support.sgi.com/linux/ A local user account on the vulnerable system is required in order to exploit capability model of the Linux kernel. This Linux kernel vulnerability can lead to a root compromise. This Linux kernel vulnerability was reported by Sendmail, Inc.: http://www2.sendmail.com/alert/ and http://sendmail.net/?feed=000607linuxbug This Linux kernel vulnerability has been publicly discussed in Usenet newsgroups and mailing lists. - -------------------------- - --- Temporary Solution --- - -------------------------- Unfortunately, there are no immediate or temporary workarounds for this issue. This issue can only be addressed with the installation of an RPM. - ---------------- - --- Solution --- - ---------------- This issue is fixed in 2.2.16 Linux kernel. For more information see: http://www.linux.org.uk/VERSION/relnotes.2216.html SGI ProPack 1.4 plans to use the 2.2.16 Linux kernel as its base. SGI has back-ported the fix to older Linux kernels in ProPack 1.2 and 1.3. SGI ProPack 1.2 is based on the 2.2.13 Linux kernel. SGI ProPack 1.3 is based on the 2.2.15 Linux kernel. Version Vulnerable Patch # Other Actions --------------- ----------- ------- ------------- SGI ProPack 1.2 yes 3993 SGI ProPack 1.3 yes 3991 SGI ProPack 1.4 no Patches are available via the web, anonymous FTP and from your SGI service/support provider. SGI patches and RPMs for Linux can be found at: http://support.sgi.com/linux/ and click on patches link and http://oss.sgi.com/projects/sgilinux-combined/download/security-fixes/ SGI patches for Windows NT or 2000 can be found at: http://support.sgi.com/nt/ IRIX 5.2-6.4 Recommended/Required Patch Sets can be found at: http://support.sgi.com/irix/ and ftp://patches.sgi.com/support/patchset/ IRIX 6.5 Maintenance Release Streams can be found at: http://support.sgi.com/irix/ and ftp://patches.sgi.com/support/relstream/ IRIX Security Patchsets can be found at: http://www.sgi.com/support/security/ and ftp://sgigate.sgi.com/patches/ SGI Security Advisories can be found at: http://www.sgi.com/support/security/ and ftp://sgigate.sgi.com/security/ The primary SGI anonymous FTP site for security information and patches is sgigate.sgi.com (204.94.209.1). Security information and patches can be found in the ~ftp/security and ~ftp/patches directories, respectively. For security and patch management reasons, ftp.sgi.com (mirror of sgigate) lags behind and does not do a real-time update of ~ftp/security and ~ftp/patches - ------------------------ - --- Acknowledgments ---- - ------------------------ SGI wishes to thank the users of the Internet Community at large for their assistance in this matter. - ----------------------------------------- - --- SGI Security Information/Contacts --- - ----------------------------------------- If there are questions about this document, email can be sent to cse-security-alert@sgi.com. ------oOo------ SGI provides security information and patches for use by the entire SGI community. This information is freely available to any person needing the information and is available via anonymous FTP and the Web. The primary SGI anonymous FTP site for security information and patches is sgigate.sgi.com (204.94.209.1). Security information and patches are located under the directories ~ftp/security and ~ftp/patches, respectively. The SGI Security Headquarters Web page is accessible at the URL: http://www.sgi.com/support/security/ For issues with the patches on the FTP sites, email can be sent to cse-security-alert@sgi.com. For assistance obtaining or working with security patches, please contact your SGI support provider. ------oOo------ SGI provides a free security mailing list service called wiretap and encourages interested parties to self-subscribe to receive (via email) all SGI Security Advisories when they are released. Subscribing to the mailing list can be done via the Web (http://www.sgi.com/support/security/wiretap.html) or by sending email to SGI as outlined below. % mail wiretap-request@sgi.com subscribe wiretap end ^d In the example above, is the email address that you wish the mailing list information sent to. The word end must be on a separate line to indicate the end of the body of the message. The control-d (^d) is used to indicate to the mail program that you are finished composing the mail message. ------oOo------ SGI provides a comprehensive customer World Wide Web site. This site is located at http://www.sgi.com/support/security/ . ------oOo------ For reporting *NEW* SGI security issues, email can be sent to security-alert@sgi.com or contact your SGI support provider. A support contract is not required for submitting a security report. ______________________________________________________________________________ This information is provided freely to all interested parties and may be redistributed provided that it is not altered in any way, SGI is appropriately credited and the document retains and includes its valid PGP signature. -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: 2.6.2 iQCVAwUBOZiEpbQ4cFApAP75AQEncwP/X4MImJVjA9DLcgo2nTlWbouKPkfrp7eS eikuIp+0+BIddhmYaPwfHABTLWR5I4wbFQfaodRN4OjHb/dZYj9eMw/qdMjarNIF aI2LHxhDf+w3Wl6a0uTn3/tiMJ66NaApHImSZqNUcRn0XNtLqVhbtwtRkD9KbqYr aw0/AZW1nSk= =yPgl -----END PGP SIGNATURE-----