USN-4163-1: Linux kernel vulnerabilities

22 October 2019

Several security issues were fixed in the Linux kernel.

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.

Learn more about Ubuntu Pro

Releases

Packages

Details

It was discovered that a race condition existed in the ARC EMAC ethernet
driver for the Linux kernel, resulting in a use-after-free vulnerability.
An attacker could use this to cause a denial of service (system crash).
(CVE-2016-10906)

It was discovered that a race condition existed in the Serial Attached SCSI
(SAS) implementation in the Linux kernel when handling certain error
conditions. A local attacker could use this to cause a denial of service
(kernel deadlock). (CVE-2017-18232)

It was discovered that the RSI 91x Wi-Fi driver in the Linux kernel did not
did not handle detach operations correctly, leading to a use-after-free
vulnerability. A physically proximate attacker could use this to cause a
denial of service (system crash) or possibly execute arbitrary code.
(CVE-2018-21008)

Wen Huang discovered that the Marvell Wi-Fi device driver in the Linux
kernel did not properly perform bounds checking, leading to a heap
overflow. A local attacker could use this to cause a denial of service
(system crash) or possibly execute arbitrary code. (CVE-2019-14814,
CVE-2019-14816)

Matt Delco discovered that the KVM hypervisor implementation in the Linux
kernel did not properly perform bounds checking when handling coalesced
MMIO write operations. A local attacker with write access to /dev/kvm could
use this to cause a denial of service (system crash). (CVE-2019-14821)

Hui Peng and Mathias Payer discovered that the USB audio driver for the
Linux kernel did not properly validate device meta data. A physically
proximate attacker could use this to cause a denial of service (system
crash). (CVE-2019-15117)

Hui Peng and Mathias Payer discovered that the USB audio driver for the
Linux kernel improperly performed recursion while handling device meta
data. A physically proximate attacker could use this to cause a denial of
service (system crash). (CVE-2019-15118)

It was discovered that the Technisat DVB-S/S2 USB device driver in the
Linux kernel contained a buffer overread. A physically proximate attacker
could use this to cause a denial of service (system crash) or possibly
expose sensitive information. (CVE-2019-15505)

Brad Spengler discovered that a Spectre mitigation was improperly
implemented in the ptrace susbsystem of the Linux kernel. A local attacker
could possibly use this to expose sensitive information. (CVE-2019-15902)

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.

Learn more about Ubuntu Pro

Update instructions

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

Ubuntu 16.04

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.

References

Related notices

Join the discussion

Need help with your security needs?

Ubuntu Pro provides up to ten-year security coverage for over 23,000 open-source packages within the Ubuntu Main and Universe repositories.

Talk to an expert to find out what would work best for you

Further reading