Synopsis

Critical: glibc security update

Type/Severity

Security Advisory: Critical

Topic

Updated glibc packages that fix one security issue are now available for
Red Hat Enterprise Linux 4 Extended Life Cycle Support.

Red Hat Product Security has rated this update as having Critical 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 glibc packages provide the standard C libraries (libc), POSIX thread
libraries (libpthread), standard math libraries (libm), and the Name
Server Caching Daemon (nscd) used by multiple programs on the system.
Without these libraries, the Linux system cannot function correctly.

A heap-based buffer overflow was found in glibc's
__nss_hostname_digits_dots() function, which is used by the gethostbyname()
and gethostbyname2() glibc function calls. A remote attacker able to make
an application call either of these functions could use this flaw to
execute arbitrary code with the permissions of the user running the
application. (CVE-2015-0235)

Red Hat would like to thank Qualys for reporting this issue.

All glibc users are advised to upgrade to these updated packages, which
contain a backported patch to correct this issue.

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/articles/11258

Affected Products

• Red Hat Enterprise Linux Server - Extended Life Cycle Support 4 x86_64
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux Server - Extended Life Cycle Support 4 ia64
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux Server - Extended Life Cycle Support 4 i386

Fixes

• BZ - 1183461 - CVE-2015-0235 glibc: __nss_hostname_digits_dots() heap-based buffer overflow

CVEs

• CVE-2015-0235

References