Synopsis
The remote Red Hat host is missing one or more security updates.
Description
The remote Redhat Enterprise Linux 6 host has packages installed that are affected by multiple vulnerabilities as referenced in the RHSA-2014:1552 advisory.
OpenSSH is OpenBSD's SSH (Secure Shell) protocol implementation.
These packages include the core files necessary for both the OpenSSH client and server.
It was discovered that OpenSSH clients did not correctly verify DNS SSHFP records. A malicious server could use this flaw to force a connecting client to skip the DNS SSHFP record check and require the user to perform manual host verification of the DNS SSHFP record. (CVE-2014-2653)
It was found that OpenSSH did not properly handle certain AcceptEnv parameter values with wildcard characters. A remote attacker could use this flaw to bypass intended environment variable restrictions. (CVE-2014-2532)
This update also fixes the following bugs:
* Based on the SP800-131A information security standard, the generation of a digital signature using the Digital Signature Algorithm (DSA) with the key size of 1024 bits and RSA with the key size of less than 2048 bits is disallowed after the year 2013. After this update, ssh-keygen no longer generates keys with less than 2048 bits in FIPS mode. However, the sshd service accepts keys of size 1024 bits as well as larger keys for compatibility reasons. (BZ#993580)
* Previously, the openssh utility incorrectly set the oom_adj value to -17 for all of its children processes. This behavior was incorrect because the children processes were supposed to have this value set to 0. This update applies a patch to fix this bug and oom_adj is now properly set to 0 for all children processes as expected. (BZ#1010429)
* Previously, if the sshd service failed to verify the checksum of an installed FIPS module using the fipscheck library, the information about this failure was only provided at the standard error output of sshd. As a consequence, the user could not notice this message and be uninformed when a system had not been properly configured for FIPS mode. To fix this bug, this behavior has been changed and sshd now sends such messages via the syslog service. (BZ#1020803)
* When keys provided by the pkcs11 library were removed from the ssh agent using the ssh-add -e command, the user was prompted to enter a PIN.
With this update, a patch has been applied to allow the user to remove the keys provided by pkcs11 without the PIN. (BZ#1042519)
In addition, this update adds the following enhancements:
* With this update, ControlPersist has been added to OpenSSH. The option in conjunction with the ControlMaster configuration directive specifies that the master connection remains open in the background after the initial client connection has been closed. (BZ#953088)
* When the sshd daemon is configured to force the internal SFTP session, and the user attempts to use a connection other than SFTP, the appropriate message is logged to the /var/log/secure file. (BZ#997377)
* Support for Elliptic Curve Cryptography modes for key exchange (ECDH) and host user keys (ECDSA) as specified by RFC5656 has been added to the openssh packages. However, they are not enabled by default and the user has to enable them manually. For more information on how to configure ECDSA and ECDH with OpenSSH, see: https://access.redhat.com/solutions/711953 (BZ#1028335)
All openssh users are advised to upgrade to these updated packages, which contain backported patches to correct these issues and add these enhancements.
Tenable has extracted the preceding description block directly from the Red Hat Enterprise Linux security advisory.
Note that Nessus has not tested for these issues but has instead relied only on the application's self-reported version number.
Solution
Update the affected packages.
Plugin Details
File Name: redhat-RHSA-2014-1552.nasl
Agent: unix
Supported Sensors: Frictionless Assessment AWS, Frictionless Assessment Azure, Frictionless Assessment Agent, Nessus Agent, Agentless Assessment, Nessus
Risk Information
Vendor
Vendor Severity: Moderate
Vector: CVSS2#AV:N/AC:M/Au:N/C:P/I:P/A:N
Vector: CVSS:3.0/AV:N/AC:H/PR:L/UI:N/S:C/C:L/I:L/A:N
Temporal Vector: CVSS:3.0/E:P/RL:O/RC:C
Vulnerability Information
CPE: p-cpe:/a:redhat:enterprise_linux:openssh-askpass, p-cpe:/a:redhat:enterprise_linux:openssh, p-cpe:/a:redhat:enterprise_linux:openssh-server, p-cpe:/a:redhat:enterprise_linux:openssh-ldap, cpe:/o:redhat:enterprise_linux:6, p-cpe:/a:redhat:enterprise_linux:pam_ssh_agent_auth, p-cpe:/a:redhat:enterprise_linux:openssh-clients
Required KB Items: Host/local_checks_enabled, Host/RedHat/release, Host/RedHat/rpm-list, Host/cpu
Exploit Ease: No known exploits are available
Patch Publication Date: 10/13/2014
Vulnerability Publication Date: 3/18/2014