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Vulnerability Assessment Details

SUSE-SA:2004:020: kernel

Vulnerability Assessment Summary
Check for the version of the kernel package

Detailed Explanation for this Vulnerability Assessment

The remote host is missing the patch for the advisory SUSE-SA:2004:020 (kernel).

Multiple security vulnerabilities are being addressed with this security
update of the Linux kernel.

Kernel memory access vulnerabilities are fixed in the e1000, decnet,
acpi_asus, alsa, airo/WLAN, pss and mpu401 drivers. These
vulnerabilities can lead to kernel memory read access, write access
and local denial of service conditions, resulting in access to the
root account for a possible hacker with a local account on the affected
system.

Missing Discretionary Access Control (DAC) checks in the chown(2) system
call permit a possible hacker with a local account to change the group
ownership of arbitrary files, which leads to root rights on affected
systems. It is specific to kernel version 2.6 based systems such as
the SUSE Linux 9.1 product, that only local shell access is needed to
exploit this vulnerability. An interesting variant of the missing
checks is that the ownership of files in the /proc filesystem can be
altered, while the changed ownership still does not permit the files to
be accessed as a non-root user for to be able to exploit the
vulnerability. Systems that are based on a version 2.4 kernel are not
vulnerable to the /proc weakness, and exploitation of the weakness
requires the use of the kernel NFS server (knfsd). If the knfsd NFS
server is not activated (it is off by default), the vulnerability is
not exposed. These issues related to the chown(2) system call have been
discovered by Michael Schroeder and Ruediger Oertel, both SUSE LINUX.

The only network-related vulnerability fixed with the kernel updates
that are subject to this announcement affect the SUSE Linux 9.1
distribution only, as it is based on a 2.6 kernel. Found and reported
to bugtraq by Adam Osuchowski and Tomasz Dubinski, the vulnerability
permits a remote attacker to send a specially crafted TCP packet to a
vulnerable system, causing that system to stall if it makes use of
TCP option matching netfilter rules.

In some rare configurations of the SUSE Linux 9.1 distribution, some
users have experienced stalling systems during system startup. These
problems are fixed with this kernel update.

Solution : http://www.suse.de/security/2004_20_kernel.html
Network Security Threat Level: High

Networks Security ID: 10352, 10566, 10779

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

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