USN-3149-2: Linux kernel (Trusty HWE) vulnerability

5 December 2016

The system could be made to run programs as an administrator.

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Details

USN-3149-1 fixed vulnerabilities in the Linux kernel for Ubuntu 14.04
LTS. This update provides the corresponding updates for the Linux
Hardware Enablement (HWE) kernel from Ubuntu 14.04 LTS for Ubuntu
12.04 LTS.

Philip Pettersson discovered a race condition in the af_packet
implementation in the Linux kernel. A local unprivileged attacker could use
this to cause a denial of service (system crash) or run arbitrary code with
administrative privileges.

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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 12.04

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.
Unless you manually uninstalled the standard kernel metapackages
(e.g. linux-generic, linux-generic-lts-RELEASE, linux-virtual,
linux-powerpc), a standard system upgrade will automatically perform
this as well.

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