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Home >> Browse Vulnerability Assessment Database >> Red Hat Local Security Checks >> RHSA-2003-259: gdm

Vulnerability Assessment Details

RHSA-2003-259: gdm

Vulnerability Assessment Summary
Check for the version of the gdm packages

Detailed Explanation for this Vulnerability Assessment

Updated GDM packages are available which correct a local crash if XDMCP is
enabled.

GDM is the GNOME Display Manager for X.

Two bugs have been found in the X Display Manager Control Protocol (XDMCP)
which could permit a denial of service attack (DoS) by crashing the gdm
daemon. The Common Vulnerabilities and Exposures project (cve.mitre.org)
has assigned the names CVE-2003-0548 and CVE-2003-0549 to these issues.

This attack is only possible if XDMCP is enabled. XDMCP is not enabled by
default in Red Hat Enterprise Linux distributions. In addition is
documented best practise that XDMCP should only ever be run on trusted
networks.

Users of XDMCP in GDM should upgrade to these erratum packages which
contain backported security fixes are are not vulnerable to these issues.

Note that Red Hat Enterprise Linux 2.1 is not vulnerable to CVE-2003-0547,
a vulnerability that permits a local user to read any text file, as it did
not have the "examine session errors" feature.

Solution : http://rhn.redhat.com/errata/RHSA-2003-259.html
Network Security Threat Level: High

Networks Security ID:

Vulnerability Assessment Copyright: This script is Copyright (C) 2004 Tenable Network Security

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