Date: 29 Aug 1999 00:44:31 -0000 From: listmaster@locutus.calderasystems.com To: announce@lists.calderasystems.com Subject: Security Advisory 23 -----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- ______________________________________________________________________________ Caldera Systems, Inc. Security Advisory Subject: serious security problem in cron Advisory number: CSSA-1999:023.0 Issue date: 1999 August, 27 Cross reference: ______________________________________________________________________________ 1. Problem Description There is a serious security problem in the cron daemon. When a program generates output, cron invokes the sendmail program as root user, passing it as arguments whatever the user defined in the MAILTO variable in his/her crontab. Sendmail understands a number of potentially dangerous options. When a normal user specifies these options, sendmail will immediately drop all root privilege. Now, since cron invokes sendmail as root user, sendmail will happily accept whatever dangerous options it is given. 2. Vulnerable Versions Systems : COL 2.2 Packages: previous to vixie-cron-3.0.1-19 3. Solutions Workaround: none The proper solution is to upgrade to the latest packages rpm -U vixie-cron-3.0.1-19.i386.rpm 4. Location of Fixed Packages The upgrade packages can be found on Caldera's FTP site at: ftp://ftp.calderasystems.com/pub/OpenLinux/updates/2.2/current/RPMS/ The corresponding source code package can be found at: ftp://ftp.calderaystems.com/pub/OpenLinux/updates/2.2/current/SRPMS 5. Installing Fixed Packages Upgrade the affected packages with the following commands: rpm -U vixie-cron-3.0.1-19.i386.rpm 6. Verification 417cd4ff2a369d7383eec6a6793b99e7 vixie-cron-3.0.1-19.i386.rpm 80cf3430d59e7c5bfc24e75eac9a9f74 vixie-cron-3.0.1-19.src.rpm 7. References This and other Caldera security resources are located at: http://www.calderasystems.com/news/security/index.html This security fix closes Caldera's internal Problem Report 5086 8. Disclaimer Caldera Systems, Inc. is not responsible for the misuse of any of the information we provide on this website and/or through our security advisories. Our advisories are a service to our customers intended to promote secure installation and use of Caldera OpenLinux. ______________________________________________________________________________ -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: 2.6.3i Charset: noconv iQCVAwUBN8Zu4un+9R4958LpAQFv2gP9E+j6oVHOE2PPtRuOI8eR4cPVmYWHOyHn RAyFJqtgqiM2NA7JhQQuN+oTPd4Yy6UDhEtzcKZmSUir5g80UnCXIzuOwN323/sE 1OTI36/N4hClLAWNO/3H56Zctua5M+tfcnJZPwUPhW19++0+X6uJ9lwv6xJNIF87 4pVOgrP5AUg= =tcPH -----END PGP SIGNATURE----- -- Note: To learn how to use this list server, email a "help" command to majordomo@lists.calderasystems.com.