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USN-1285-1: Linux kernel vulnerabilities

29 November 2011

Several security issues were fixed in the kernel.

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Releases

Packages

Details

Andrea Righi discovered a race condition in the KSM memory merging support.
If KSM was being used, a local attacker could exploit this to crash the
system, leading to a denial of service. (CVE-2011-2183)

Vasily Averin discovered that the NFS Lock Manager (NLM) incorrectly
handled unlock requests. A local attacker could exploit this to cause a
denial of service. (CVE-2011-2491)

Vasiliy Kulikov discovered that taskstats did not enforce access
restrictions. A local attacker could exploit this to read certain
information, leading to a loss of privacy. (CVE-2011-2494)

Vasiliy Kulikov discovered that /proc/PID/io did not enforce access
restrictions. A local attacker could exploit this to read certain
information, leading to a loss of privacy. (CVE-2011-2495)

It was discovered that the wireless stack incorrectly verified SSID
lengths. A local attacker could exploit this to cause a denial of service
or gain root privileges. (CVE-2011-2517)

Christian Ohm discovered that the perf command looks for configuration
files in the current directory. If a privileged user were tricked into
running perf in a directory containing a malicious configuration file, an
attacker could run arbitrary commands and possibly gain privileges.
(CVE-2011-2905)

Vasiliy Kulikov discovered that the Comedi driver did not correctly clear
memory. A local attacker could exploit this to read kernel stack memory,
leading to a loss of privacy. (CVE-2011-2909)

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.

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Update instructions

The problem can be corrected by updating your system to the following package versions:

Ubuntu 11.04

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. If
you use linux-restricted-modules, you have to update that package as
well to get modules which work with the new kernel version. Unless you
manually uninstalled the standard kernel metapackages (e.g. linux-generic,
linux-server, linux-powerpc), a standard system upgrade will automatically
perform this as well.

References

Related notices

  • USN-1272-1: linux-image-2.6.35-31-powerpc64-smp, linux, linux-image-2.6.35-31-generic, linux-image-2.6.35-31-powerpc, linux-image-2.6.35-31-omap, linux-image-2.6.35-31-powerpc-smp, linux-image-2.6.35-31-server, linux-image-2.6.35-31-versatile, linux-image-2.6.35-31-virtual, linux-image-2.6.35-31-generic-pae
  • USN-1281-1: linux-ti-omap4, linux-image-2.6.38-1209-omap4
  • USN-1203-1: linux-image-2.6.32-218-dove, linux-mvl-dove
  • USN-1279-1: linux-image-2.6.38-13-server, linux-image-2.6.38-13-generic, linux-image-2.6.38-13-virtual, linux-image-2.6.38-13-generic-pae, linux-lts-backport-natty
  • USN-1278-1: linux-image-2.6.35-31-generic, linux-lts-backport-maverick, linux-image-2.6.35-31-server, linux-image-2.6.35-31-virtual, linux-image-2.6.35-31-generic-pae
  • USN-1218-1: linux, linux-image-2.6.32-34-preempt, linux-image-2.6.32-34-sparc64-smp, linux-image-2.6.32-34-386, linux-image-2.6.32-34-virtual, linux-image-2.6.32-34-sparc64, linux-image-2.6.32-34-powerpc, linux-image-2.6.32-34-powerpc64-smp, linux-image-2.6.32-34-versatile, linux-image-2.6.32-34-generic, linux-image-2.6.32-34-powerpc-smp, linux-image-2.6.32-34-server, linux-image-2.6.32-34-generic-pae, linux-image-2.6.32-34-ia64, linux-image-2.6.32-34-lpia
  • USN-1244-1: linux-ti-omap4, linux-image-2.6.35-903-omap4
  • USN-1208-1: linux-image-2.6.32-418-dove, linux-mvl-dove
  • USN-1216-1: linux-ec2, linux-image-2.6.32-318-ec2
  • USN-1269-1: linux-ec2, linux-image-2.6.32-340-ec2
  • USN-1286-1: linux, linux-image-2.6.32-36-powerpc64-smp, linux-image-2.6.32-36-powerpc, linux-image-2.6.32-36-versatile, linux-image-2.6.32-36-ia64, linux-image-2.6.32-36-386, linux-image-2.6.32-36-generic-pae, linux-image-2.6.32-36-generic, linux-image-2.6.32-36-powerpc-smp, linux-image-2.6.32-36-lpia, linux-image-2.6.32-36-virtual, linux-image-2.6.32-36-preempt, linux-image-2.6.32-36-sparc64, linux-image-2.6.32-36-server, linux-image-2.6.32-36-sparc64-smp
  • USN-1268-1: linux-image-2.6.24-30-lpiacompat, linux-image-2.6.24-30-hppa64, linux-image-2.6.24-30-powerpc-smp, linux-image-2.6.24-30-openvz, linux-image-2.6.24-30-server, linux-image-2.6.24-30-sparc64-smp, linux-image-2.6.24-30-hppa32, linux-image-2.6.24-30-sparc64, linux-image-2.6.24-30-lpia, linux-image-2.6.24-30-powerpc, linux-image-2.6.24-30-mckinley, linux, linux-image-2.6.24-30-generic, linux-image-2.6.24-30-xen, linux-image-2.6.24-30-rt, linux-image-2.6.24-30-virtual, linux-image-2.6.24-30-powerpc64-smp, linux-image-2.6.24-30-386, linux-image-2.6.24-30-itanium
  • USN-1274-1: linux-mvl-dove, linux-image-2.6.32-420-dove
  • USN-1271-1: linux-image-2.6.31-612-imx51, linux-fsl-imx51
  • USN-1294-1: linux-image-3.0.0-13-server, linux-lts-backport-oneiric, linux-image-3.0.0-13-generic-pae, linux-image-3.0.0-13-generic, linux-image-3.0.0-13-virtual
  • USN-1241-1: linux-image-2.6.31-611-imx51, linux-fsl-imx51
  • USN-1243-1: linux-image-2.6.35-30-omap, linux-image-2.6.35-30-generic, linux, linux-image-2.6.35-30-powerpc-smp, linux-image-2.6.35-30-virtual, linux-image-2.6.35-30-powerpc, linux-image-2.6.35-30-powerpc64-smp, linux-image-2.6.35-30-generic-pae, linux-image-2.6.35-30-versatile, linux-image-2.6.35-30-server
  • USN-1253-1: linux-image-2.6.32-35-generic-pae, linux, linux-image-2.6.32-35-sparc64-smp, linux-image-2.6.32-35-386, linux-image-2.6.32-35-generic, linux-image-2.6.32-35-server, linux-image-2.6.32-35-powerpc-smp, linux-image-2.6.32-35-preempt, linux-image-2.6.32-35-ia64, linux-image-2.6.32-35-versatile, linux-image-2.6.32-35-virtual, linux-image-2.6.32-35-powerpc, linux-image-2.6.32-35-sparc64, linux-image-2.6.32-35-lpia, linux-image-2.6.32-35-powerpc64-smp
  • USN-1239-1: linux-ec2, linux-image-2.6.32-319-ec2
  • USN-1236-1: linux-image-2.6.24-29-386, linux-image-2.6.24-29-xen, linux-image-2.6.24-29-itanium, linux-image-2.6.24-29-lpia, linux-image-2.6.24-29-lpiacompat, linux-image-2.6.24-29-rt, linux-image-2.6.24-29-generic, linux-image-2.6.24-29-powerpc-smp, linux-image-2.6.24-29-powerpc64-smp, linux-image-2.6.24-29-virtual, linux, linux-image-2.6.24-29-hppa32, linux-image-2.6.24-29-sparc64, linux-image-2.6.24-29-mckinley, linux-image-2.6.24-29-sparc64-smp, linux-image-2.6.24-29-hppa64, linux-image-2.6.24-29-powerpc, linux-image-2.6.24-29-openvz, linux-image-2.6.24-29-server
  • USN-1275-1: linux, linux-image-3.0.0-13-powerpc-smp, linux-image-3.0.0-13-server, linux-image-3.0.0-13-generic-pae, linux-image-3.0.0-13-generic, linux-image-3.0.0-13-virtual, linux-image-3.0.0-13-omap, linux-image-3.0.0-13-powerpc64-smp, linux-image-3.0.0-13-powerpc
  • USN-1240-1: linux-mvl-dove, linux-image-2.6.32-219-dove
  • USN-1260-1: linux-image-3.0.0-1206-omap4, linux-ti-omap4
  • USN-1245-1: linux-image-2.6.32-419-dove, linux-mvl-dove
  • USN-1242-1: linux-image-2.6.35-30-generic, linux-lts-backport-maverick, linux-image-2.6.35-30-virtual, linux-image-2.6.35-30-generic-pae, linux-image-2.6.35-30-server

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