RHSA-2013:0241 - Security Advisory

Topic

Updated xen packages that fix one security issue are now available for
Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5.

The Red Hat Security Response Team has rated this update as having moderate
security impact. A Common Vulnerability Scoring System (CVSS) base score,
which gives a detailed severity rating, is available from the CVE link in
the References section.

Description

The xen packages contain administration tools and the xend service for
managing the kernel-xen kernel for virtualization on Red Hat Enterprise
Linux.

A flaw was found in the way libxc, the Xen control library, handled
excessively large kernel and ramdisk images when starting new guests. A
privileged guest user in a para-virtualized guest (a DomU) could create a
crafted kernel or ramdisk image that, when attempting to use it during
guest start, could result in an out-of-memory condition in the privileged
domain (the Dom0). (CVE-2012-4544)

Red Hat would like to thank the Xen project for reporting this issue.

All users of xen are advised to upgrade to these updated packages, which
correct this issue. After installing the updated packages, the xend service
must be restarted for this update to take effect.

Solution

Before applying this update, make sure all previously-released errata
relevant to your system have been applied.

This update is available via the Red Hat Network. Details on how to
use the Red Hat Network to apply this update are available at
https://access.redhat.com/knowledge/articles/11258

Affected Products

• Red Hat Enterprise Linux Server 5 x86_64
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux Server 5 ia64
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux Server 5 i386
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux for x86_64 - Extended Update Support 5.9 x86_64
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux for x86_64 - Extended Update Support 5.9 ia64
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux for x86_64 - Extended Update Support 5.9 i386
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux Workstation 5 i386
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux Server from RHUI 5 i386
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux Server - Extended Update Support from RHUI 5.9 x86_64
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux Server - Extended Update Support from RHUI 5.9 i386
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux Server - AUS 5.9 x86_64
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux Server - AUS 5.9 ia64
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux Server - AUS 5.9 i386
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux Workstation 5 x86_64
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux Desktop 5 x86_64
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux Desktop 5 i386
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux Server from RHUI 5 x86_64

Fixes

• BZ - 870412 - CVE-2012-4544 xen: Xen domain builder Out-of-memory due to malicious kernel/ramdisk

CVEs

• CVE-2012-4544

References

• https://access.redhat.com/security/updates/classification/#moderate