TurboLinux Security Announcement: Package: pam-0.70-2 and earlier; usermode-1.6-1 and earlier

Date: Fri, 14 Apr 2000 11:47:23 -0700 (PDT)
From: Katie Moussouris k8e@mail.turbolinux.com
To: tl-security-announce@turbolinux.com
Subject: [TL-Security-Announce] PAM and usermode TLSA2000009-1

TurboLinux Security Announcement

Package: pam-0.70-2 and earlier; usermode-1.6-1 and earlier
Date: Fri Apr 14 10:49:07 PDT 2000

Affected TurboLinux versions: 6.0.2 and earlier
Vulnerability Type: local root compromise
TurboLinux Advisory ID#: TLSA2000009-1
BugTraq ID#: 913
Credits: This vulnerability was posted to Bugtraq in a L0pht
security advisory written by Dildog on January 4, 2000.

A security hole was discovered in the packages mentioned above.
Please update the packages in your installation as soon as possible
or disable the service.

1. Problem Summary

Nobody says it like Dildog: “Both ‘pam’ and ‘userhelper’ (a
setuid binary that comes with the ‘usermode-1.15’ rpm) follow ..
paths. Since pam_start calls down to _pam_add_handler(), we can get
it to dlopen any file on disk. ‘userhelper’ being setuid means we
can get root.”

2. Impact

A local user can use this vulnerability to get root.

3. Solution

Update the packages from our ftp server by running the following
command:

rpm -Fvh ftp_path_to_filename

Where ftp_path_to_filename is the following:

ftp://ftp.turbolinux.com/pub/updates/6.0/security/pam-0.72-3.i386.rpm

Run the above command again, where ftp_path_to_filename is:

ftp://ftp.turbolinux.com/pub/updates/6.0/security/usermode-1.18-1.i386.rpm

The source rpms can be downloaded here:

ftp://ftp.turbolinux.com/pub/updates/6.0/SRPMS/pam-0.72-3.src.rpm

ftp://ftp.turbolinux.com/pub/updates/6.0/SRPMS/usermode-1.18-1.src.rpm

**Note: You must rebuild and install the rpm if you choose to
download and install the srpm. Simply installing the srpm alone
WILL NOT CLOSE THE SECURITY HOLE.

Please verify the md5 checksum of the update before you
install:

  MD5 sum                               Package Name

91828f6e10423ae7ccae8496b418ad9a pam-0.72-3.i386.rpm
5f24ee48a6f3c6c4760150a1b00b98e9 usermode-1.18-1.i386.rpm

9d6fc46f0b3ce68c8398e152d20e142d pam-0.72-3.src.rpm
85f7906172a00718f0bf30cb76fee945 usermode-1.18-1.src.rpm

These packages are GPG signed by Turbolinux for security. Our key
is available here:

http://www.turbolinux.com/security/tlgpgkey.asc

To verify a package, use the following command:

rpm –checksig name_of_rpm

To examine only the md5sum, use the following command:

rpm –checksig –nogpg name_of_rpm

**Note: Checking GPG keys requires RPM 3.0 or higher.

You can find more updates on our ftp server:

ftp://ftp.turbolinux.com/pub/updates/6.0/security/
for TL6.0 Workstation and Server security updates
ftp://ftp.turbolinux.com/pub/updates/4.0/security/
for TL4.0 Workstation and Server security updates

Our webpage for security announcements:

http://www.turbolinux.com/security

If you want to report vulnerabilities, please contact:

rt-security@turbolinux.com

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