Security flaws in Kernel/X.org

Linux pure!

Moderators: b1o, jkerr82508

User avatar
viking60
Über-Berserk
Posts: 9351
Joined: 14 Mar 2010, 16:34

Security flaws in Kernel/X.org

Postby viking60 » 19 Aug 2010, 09:59

"Invisible Thing Lab" has found a serious security hole in Kernel/X.org that could give intruders full root access to your box with any graphical application via X-server.

A temporary fix was made on the 13th August, and kernel 2.6.27.52, 2.6.32.19, 2.6.34.4, and 2.6.35.2 have now been patched with this fix.

The hole in the security was published yesterday:
http://theinvisiblethings.blogspot.com/ ... in-linux...

https://bugzilla.redhat.com/show_bug.cg ... -2010-2240
http://www.desktoplinux.com/news/NS7769 ... tml?kc=rss
http://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?page=n ... &px=ODUyMA
http://www.invisiblethingslab.com/itl/Welcome.html
Manjaro 64bit on the main box -Intel(R) Core(TM) i7 CPU 920 @ 2.67GHz and nVidia Corporation GT200b [GeForce GTX 275] (rev a1. + Centos on the server - Arch on the laptop.
"There are no stupid questions - Only stupid answers!"

User avatar
dedanna1029
Sound-Berserk
Posts: 8780
Joined: 14 Mar 2010, 20:29
Contact:

Re: Security flaws in Kernel/X.org

Postby dedanna1029 » 19 Aug 2010, 10:02

Oh yay. Not. You mean I gotta go thru all that xorg crap again? (Fedora and Arch both)

Edit: Tell you what. First one that gets borked from the updates, is the first one I take off my machine. I'm getting real tired of this. They better get it right the first time (wow. I just made a real good joke there 'cause I know it's not gonna happen).


http://twitter.com/dedanna1029/status/21563110698
I'd rather be a free person who fears terrorists, than be a "safe" person who fears the government.
No gods, no masters.
"A druid is by nature anarchistic, that is, submits to no one."
http://uk.druidcollege.org/faqs.html

User avatar
viking60
Über-Berserk
Posts: 9351
Joined: 14 Mar 2010, 16:34

Re: Security flaws in Kernel/X.org

Postby viking60 » 19 Aug 2010, 10:48

dedanna1029 wrote:Oh yay. Not. You mean I gotta go thru all that xorg crap again? (Fedora and Arch both)

Edit: Tell you what. First one that gets borked from the updates, is the first one I take off my machine. I'm getting real tired of this. They better get it right the first time (wow. I just made a real good joke there 'cause I know it's not gonna happen).


http://twitter.com/dedanna1029/status/21563110698


No you will probably not be affected by it unless you run a server with other users. The exploit needs an "attacker" and he needs to allocate many large pixmaps. Thus exhausting X-servers address space. Then he must create a shared memory segment S and force X server to attach it to the only available region left, which will be close above the stack. Then the attacker instructs the X-server to call a recursive function which results in the stack being extended and the stack pointer being moved to S for a brief period of time (during recursion).
The attacker can then write to S. This will override the stack locations and allow the code execution = very bad :evil:

There is no error or misbehavior in the software you got so even if you blame it - it probably is just you that fubared :D The evil :twisted: person needs to have access to your system. But when he has that, there is nothing stopping him from exploiting X.

This error has most likely been around for years since kernel 2.6.
Manjaro 64bit on the main box -Intel(R) Core(TM) i7 CPU 920 @ 2.67GHz and nVidia Corporation GT200b [GeForce GTX 275] (rev a1. + Centos on the server - Arch on the laptop.
"There are no stupid questions - Only stupid answers!"

User avatar
dedanna1029
Sound-Berserk
Posts: 8780
Joined: 14 Mar 2010, 20:29
Contact:

Re: Security flaws in Kernel/X.org

Postby dedanna1029 » 19 Aug 2010, 17:12

Man, I can't even mentally keep up with all that, much less imagine someone doing it LOL. Hard to follow for me.
I'd rather be a free person who fears terrorists, than be a "safe" person who fears the government.
No gods, no masters.
"A druid is by nature anarchistic, that is, submits to no one."
http://uk.druidcollege.org/faqs.html

User avatar
viking60
Über-Berserk
Posts: 9351
Joined: 14 Mar 2010, 16:34

Re: Security flaws in Kernel/X.org

Postby viking60 » 19 Aug 2010, 21:09

Basically there has to be person involved - that has access to your computer. And he has to be a bad person - like a politician or something :f
Edit:
Sorry we can rule them out - the person has to be smart too :mrgreen:
Manjaro 64bit on the main box -Intel(R) Core(TM) i7 CPU 920 @ 2.67GHz and nVidia Corporation GT200b [GeForce GTX 275] (rev a1. + Centos on the server - Arch on the laptop.
"There are no stupid questions - Only stupid answers!"

User avatar
dedanna1029
Sound-Berserk
Posts: 8780
Joined: 14 Mar 2010, 20:29
Contact:

Re: Security flaws in Kernel/X.org

Postby dedanna1029 » 19 Aug 2010, 22:22

viking60 wrote:Basically there has to be person involved - that has access to your computer. And he has to be a bad person - like a politician or something :f
Edit:
Sorry we can rule them out - the person has to be smart too :mrgreen:

*giggles* LOL
I'd rather be a free person who fears terrorists, than be a "safe" person who fears the government.
No gods, no masters.
"A druid is by nature anarchistic, that is, submits to no one."
http://uk.druidcollege.org/faqs.html


Return to “Kernel”