Heap-based buffer overflow in the parse_packet function in network.c in collectd before 5.4.3 and 5.x before 5.5.2 allows remote attackers to cause a denial of service (daemon crash) or possibly execute arbitrary code via a crafted network packet.

The remote Ubuntu 16.04 ESM host has packages installed that are affected by multiple vulnerabilities as referenced in the USN-4793-1 advisory.

    It was discovered that collectd mishandled certain malformed packets. A remote attacker could use this     vulnerability to cause collectd to crash or possibly execute arbitrary code. (CVE-2016-6254)

    It was discovered that collectd failed to handle certain input. An attacker could use this vulnerability     to cause collectd to crash. (CVE-2017-16820)

    It was discovered that collectd mishandles certain malformed network packets. A remote attacker could use     this vulnerability to cause a Denial of Service or consume system resources. (CVE-2017-7401)

Tenable has extracted the preceding description block directly from the Ubuntu security advisory.

Note that Nessus has not tested for these issues but has instead relied only on the application's self-reported version number.

A heap-based buffer overflow in the parse_packet function in network.c in collectd allows remote attackers to cause a denial of service (daemon crash) or possibly execute arbitrary code via a crafted network packet.

The collectd Project reports :

Emilien Gaspar has identified a heap overflow in collectd's network plugin which can be triggered remotely and is potentially exploitable.

- Upstream released new version     (https://collectd.org/news.shtml#news98)

  - Contains fix for CVE-2016-6254

  - Drop a few patches applied upstream

Note that Tenable Network Security has extracted the preceding description block directly from the Fedora update system website.
Tenable has attempted to automatically clean and format it as much as possible without introducing additional issues.

Emilien Gaspar discovered that collectd, a statistics collection and monitoring daemon, incorrectly processed incoming network packets.
This resulted in a heap overflow, allowing a remote attacker to either cause a DoS via application crash, or potentially execute arbitrary code.

Additionally, security researchers at Columbia University and the University of Virginia discovered that collectd failed to verify a return value during initialization. This meant the daemon could sometimes be started without the desired, secure settings.

ID	Name	Product	Family	Severity
183566	Ubuntu 16.04 ESM : collectd vulnerabilities (USN-4793-1)	Nessus	Ubuntu Local Security Checks	critical
93251	Amazon Linux AMI : collectd (ALAS-2016-739)	Nessus	Amazon Linux Local Security Checks	critical
92813	FreeBSD : collectd -- Network plugin heap overflow (6da45e38-5b55-11e6-8859-000c292ee6b8)	Nessus	FreeBSD Local Security Checks	critical
92737	Fedora 24 : collectd (2016-e16a14ffc5)	Nessus	Fedora Local Security Checks	critical
92732	Fedora 23 : collectd (2016-23f0d552e8)	Nessus	Fedora Local Security Checks	critical
92644	Debian DSA-3636-1 : collectd - security update	Nessus	Debian Local Security Checks	critical

Detections

Analytics

CVE-2016-6254

critical

Tenable Plugins

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