Synopsis: Moderate: kexec-tools security, bug fix, and enhancement update Issue Date: 2012-02-21 CVE Numbers: CVE-2011-3588 The kexec-tools package contains the /sbin/kexec binary and utilities that together form the user-space component of the kernel's kexec feature. The /sbin/kexec binary facilitates a new kernel to boot using the kernel's kexec feature either on a normal or a panic reboot. The kexec fastboot mechanism allows booting a Linux kernel from the context of an already running kernel. Kdump used the SSH (Secure Shell) "StrictHostKeyChecking=no" option when dumping to SSH targets, causing the target kdump server's SSH host key not to be checked. This could make it easier for a man-in-the-middle attacker on the local network to impersonate the kdump SSH target server and possibly gain access to sensitive information in the vmcore dumps. (CVE-2011-3588) The mkdumprd utility created initrd files with world-readable permissions. A local user could possibly use this flaw to gain access to sensitive information, such as the private SSH key used to authenticate to a remote server when kdump was configured to dump to an SSH target. (CVE-2011-3589) The mkdumprd utility included unneeded sensitive files (such as all files from the "/root/.ssh/" directory and the host's private SSH keys) in the resulting initrd. This could lead to an information leak when initrd files were previously created with world-readable permissions. Note: With this update, only the SSH client configuration, known hosts files, and the SSH key configured via the newly introduced sshkey option in "/etc/kdump.conf" are included in the initrd. The default is the key generated when running the "service kdump propagate" command, "/root/.ssh/kdump_id_rsa". (CVE-2011-3590) This updated kexec-tools package also includes numerous bug fixes and enhancements. All users of kexec-tools are advised to upgrade to this updated package, which resolves these security issues, fixes these bugs and adds these enhancements. SL5: i386 kexec-tools-1.102pre-154.el5.i386.rpm kexec-tools-debuginfo-1.102pre-154.el5.i386.rpm x86_64 kexec-tools-1.102pre-154.el5.x86_64.rpm kexec-tools-debuginfo-1.102pre-154.el5.x86_64.rpm - Scientific Linux Development Team