Debian Security Advisory

DSA-276-1 linux-kernel-s390 -- local privilege escalation

Date Reported:
03 Apr 2003
Affected Packages:
kernel-patch-2.4.17-s390, kernel-image-2.4.17-s390
Vulnerable:
Yes
Security database references:
In the Bugtraq database (at SecurityFocus): BugTraq ID 7112.
In Mitre's CVE dictionary: CVE-2003-0127.
More information:

The kernel module loader in Linux 2.2 and Linux 2.4 kernels has a flaw in ptrace. This hole allows local users to obtain root privileges by using ptrace to attach to a child process that is spawned by the kernel. Remote exploitation of this hole is not possible.

This advisory only covers kernel packages for the S/390 architecture. Other architectures will be covered by separate advisories.

For the stable distribution (woody) this problem has been fixed in the following versions:

  • kernel-patch-2.4.17-s390: version 0.0.20020816-0.woody.1.1
  • kernel-image-2.4.17-s390: version 2.4.17-2.woody.2.2

The old stable distribution (potato) is not affected by this problem for this architecture since s390 was first released with Debian GNU/Linux 3.0 (woody).

For the unstable distribution (sid) this problem will be fixed soon.

We recommend that you upgrade your kernel-images packages immediately.

Fixed in:

Debian GNU/Linux 3.0 (woody)

Source:
http://security.debian.org/pool/updates/main/k/kernel-patch-2.4.17-s390/kernel-patch-2.4.17-s390_0.0.20020816-0.woody.1.1.dsc
http://security.debian.org/pool/updates/main/k/kernel-patch-2.4.17-s390/kernel-patch-2.4.17-s390_0.0.20020816-0.woody.1.1.diff.gz
http://security.debian.org/pool/updates/main/k/kernel-patch-2.4.17-s390/kernel-patch-2.4.17-s390_0.0.20020816.orig.tar.gz
http://security.debian.org/pool/updates/main/k/kernel-image-2.4.17-s390/kernel-image-2.4.17-s390_2.4.17-2.woody.2.2.dsc
http://security.debian.org/pool/updates/main/k/kernel-image-2.4.17-s390/kernel-image-2.4.17-s390_2.4.17-2.woody.2.2.tar.gz
Architecture-independent component:
http://security.debian.org/pool/updates/main/k/kernel-patch-2.4.17-s390/kernel-patch-2.4.17-s390_0.0.20020816-0.woody.1.1_all.deb
IBM S/390:
http://security.debian.org/pool/updates/main/k/kernel-image-2.4.17-s390/kernel-headers-2.4.17_2.4.17-2.woody.2.2_s390.deb
http://security.debian.org/pool/updates/main/k/kernel-image-2.4.17-s390/kernel-image-2.4.17-s390_2.4.17-2.woody.2.2_s390.deb

MD5 checksums of the listed files are available in the original advisory.