CentOS 6 : pam (CESA-2013:0521)

medium Nessus Plugin ID 65152

Synopsis

The remote CentOS host is missing one or more security updates.

Description

Updated pam packages that fix two security issues, several bugs, and add various enhancements are now available for Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6.

The Red Hat Security Response Team has rated this update as having moderate security impact. Common Vulnerability Scoring System (CVSS) base scores, which give detailed severity ratings, are available for each vulnerability from the CVE links in the References section.

Pluggable Authentication Modules (PAM) provide a system whereby administrators can set up authentication policies without having to recompile programs to handle authentication.

A stack-based buffer overflow flaw was found in the way the pam_env module parsed users' '~/.pam_environment' files. If an application's PAM configuration contained 'user_readenv=1' (this is not the default), a local attacker could use this flaw to crash the application or, possibly, escalate their privileges. (CVE-2011-3148)

A denial of service flaw was found in the way the pam_env module expanded certain environment variables. If an application's PAM configuration contained 'user_readenv=1' (this is not the default), a local attacker could use this flaw to cause the application to enter an infinite loop. (CVE-2011-3149)

Red Hat would like to thank Kees Cook of the Google ChromeOS Team for reporting the CVE-2011-3148 and CVE-2011-3149 issues.

These updated pam packages include numerous bug fixes and enhancements. Space precludes documenting all of these changes in this advisory. Users are directed to the Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6.4 Technical Notes, linked to in the References, for information on the most significant of these changes.

All pam users are advised to upgrade to these updated packages, which contain backported patches to correct these issues and add these enhancements.

Solution

Update the affected pam packages.

See Also

http://www.nessus.org/u?a66dcc2d

http://www.nessus.org/u?c91523f5

Plugin Details

Severity: Medium

ID: 65152

File Name: centos_RHSA-2013-0521.nasl

Version: 1.9

Type: local

Agent: unix

Published: 3/10/2013

Updated: 1/4/2021

Supported Sensors: Agentless Assessment, Continuous Assessment, Frictionless Assessment Agent, Frictionless Assessment AWS, Frictionless Assessment Azure, Nessus

Risk Information

VPR

Risk Factor: Medium

Score: 5.8

CVSS v2

Risk Factor: Medium

Base Score: 4.6

Temporal Score: 3.4

Vector: CVSS2#AV:L/AC:L/Au:N/C:P/I:P/A:P

CVSS Score Source: CVE-2011-3148

Vulnerability Information

CPE: p-cpe:/a:centos:centos:pam-devel, p-cpe:/a:centos:centos:pam, cpe:/o:centos:centos:6

Required KB Items: Host/local_checks_enabled, Host/CentOS/release, Host/CentOS/rpm-list

Exploit Ease: No known exploits are available

Patch Publication Date: 3/8/2013

Vulnerability Publication Date: 7/22/2012

Reference Information

CVE: CVE-2011-3148, CVE-2011-3149

BID: 50343

RHSA: 2013:0521