LWN.net Weekly Edition for February 15, 2007

The Grumpy Editor's guide to note-taking applications

This article is part of the LWN Grumpy Editor series.

Your editor is not always the most organized person. He is pretty sure he still has a desk under the pile of papers, unpaid bills, and random electronic components that surrounds his monitor - but he has not seen it for some time. There are lots of sheets of paper full of handwritten notes on that desk, but many of them have not seen the light of day for years. There's probably some good stuff to be found in there, somewhere.

This is the information age, of course, and paper full of handwritten notes is tremendously obsolete. Your editor's pen just doesn't have enough fonts, and, besides, contemporary disk drives allow for the creation of much higher piles of stuff. It's clearly time to go electronic.

There are numerous applications out there which are aimed at people trying to create a digital note pile; your editor decided it was time to give a few of them a try. As a way of narrowing the field somewhat, only graphical applications were considered; command-line utilities, Emacs modes, and so on were taken off the list. There's no shortage of web-based wiki systems which can be employed in this role, but they are a topic for another article some other time. Finally, there are a few systems which are aimed at "mind mapping," which is a different objective entirely. Mind mapping applications are on your editor's list to review, but, according to his kids, your editor has lost his mind entirely and will thus have a hard time mapping it.

Each application was looked at from a simple point of view: how well does it support the tasks of quickly and easily creating, organizing, finding, and using notes? There are, as we will see, a few approaches to this task.

xpad

There are a few applications which try to emulate the classic yellow pad of sticky notes - but without the glue; xpad is one of those. It maintains a series of little yellow windows, each of which can contain simple text in a single font. The font and colors can be changed, but only on a global basis. The first line of notes in each window becomes the title for that window.

Like a number of note-taking applications, xpad puts an icon into the panel task area. Simply clicking on that icon appears to do nothing - though double-clicking causes all known notes to show up in the current workspace. The right mouse button yields a menu with the titles of each note window, along with "show all" and "close all" options. "Close all" doesn't just close the windows, it causes the application to exit completely.

There is an "edit lock" feature in xpad; it turns off editing on all notes. There does not appear to be a way to lock a single window. There's not a lot of other features available: no searching, no linking between notes, no audio effects, etc. As a basic notepad, however, xpad seems good enough.

xpostit

Xpostit may be the oldest of the applications reviewed by your editor. It has no web page; it would, in fact, appear to predate the web. It features those round Xaw buttons which became briefly popular after X11R4 came out. Beyond that, the interface is quite strange. Running xpostit pops up a single, small (maybe 1.5cm square on your editor's display) window with a plaid, presumably trademark-infringing design. Clicking on that window does nothing until the right button is used, at which point the user is rewarded with a menu allowing the creation of notes in several predefined sizes.

Note windows contain simple text in the ugliest monospace font the developers could find. There is, beyond doubt, some X resource which can be employed to change that font, but your editor, it must be said, has not found messing around with X resources cool for some years now.

Xpostit is one of the few notes applications with a "save" button; most of them save notes implicitly. There are no features of interest beyond the provision of containers for bare text. There is no panel icon, and no way to find a specific note beyond getting them all on-screen with "show all" and starting to dig. In your editor's opinion, xpostit is an application whose time has passed.

knotes

KNotes is a KDE-based notepad; like others, it is based on the little yellow window concept. It has a more contemporary feel, however, and is notably nicer to work with. The initial impression can be just a bit off-putting, though, at least for those running KNotes outside of a KDE desktop. KNotes puts up a shaped window without the usual window manager decorations; instead, there is a yellow title bar with a red thumbtack in it. The thumbtack does not appear to do anything other than function as a cute example of the X11 shape extension. The title bar can be used to drag the window around in the usual way, but employing the right button does not yield the usual window manager menu; instead, most of the KNotes functionality can be found there.

KNotes puts an icon in the task area; clicking on it gives a menu of note titles. Selecting a title will move to the virtual desktop containing the note (if any), a bit of a disorienting experience for users who are not expecting it. Even worse, it remembers which desktop last contained a note, and will put the note back in that desktop before moving. The right mouse button gives a menu with a number of options, including creating new notes, adjusting the ample (this is KDE, after all) configuration options, and searching.

The search function is a valuable thing for a notes application to have; once the number of notes gets large, it can get hard to remember where something specific can be found. KNotes search is nice, in that it searches through all notes and it supports regular expressions. There are a couple of rough spots, though; if the next occurrence of the desired text is in a window found on a different virtual desktop, it moves the desktop rather than the window. Then it helpfully puts up a little "search for the next occurrence?" dialog - directly on top of the window containing the text the user was looking for.

There are a few features unique to KNotes. One of those is alarms, added presumably so that the user can use notes as a simple appointment manager. There is an option to send notes via email. It is also possible to send notes directly to an instance of KNotes running on another system - though the acceptance of notes over the network is (sensibly) turned off by default. Notes can be locked on a per-note basis, preventing inadvertent modification of notes when desired.

Another nice feature is that notes can be dismissed by hitting the escape key. As a result, pulling up a note, adding a line, and making it go away can be a very quick operation - and that, in turn, encourages the keeping of good and complete notes. Without the desktop warping, KNotes would be almost perfect as a simple, quick, capable, and visually attractive notes manager.

It's worth noting (so to speak) that KNotes is also available as a component of the Kontact organizer. Running Kontact gives access to all of the notes created in KNotes, but it appears that the full integration of this functionality is a work in progress. Kontact notes windows look more like traditional text editing windows; they do not appear to be intended to be left around the screen like KNotes windows. Kontact does add a spelling checker, however. Even so, in your editor's opinion, KNotes works better as a standalone application at this time.

Tomboy

Tomboy is a GNOME and Mono-based note-taking application which attempts to provide both simplicity and useful features. Your editor has been using it for some months now.

Tomboy places an icon on the panel - not in the task area. Clicking on that icon yields a menu with the titles of the ten most recently modified notes, along with create and search options. Unfortunately, your editor seems to cycle through a set of about eleven notes, with the result that the desired one is often not on the list. Selecting "search all notes" brings up a dialog with all known notes and a simple search box. Typing text into that box trims the list of notes to those containing matches. There is no regular expression capability.

The escape key will dismiss a Tomboy window; combined with the panel icon, this feature allows for quick note updates.

A feature unique to Tomboy - at least, among the applications reviewed here - is the ability to link between notes. By highlighting a term, the user can create a new note using that term as its title; thereafter, clicking on the term will bring up the new note. There is also a backlink feature: the tools menu includes a "what links here?" item which will give a list of notes linking to the current one.

Tomboy has a fair number of options for decorating text with different fonts, colors, sizes, etc. For the most part, there is not much use for this capability in a note-taking application, but the ability to create bold headers can be nice. It's also useful to be able to strike out text to, for example, mark off completed items on a "to do" list. A long list of crossed-out items just gives more satisfaction than simply deleting them, somehow. Tomboy will also create bulleted lists when lines are typed beginning with an asterisk.

Notes can be printed (a feature not supported by all applications) or exported to HTML. There is a plugin mechanism which can be used to add interesting functionality; current plugins offer integration with evolution and bugzilla, for example. Tomboy also has a spelling checker which, by default, decorates notes with lots of obnoxious red underlines. It is rare that perfect spelling is required in a collection of personal notes, however, so your editor is pleased that this feature can be turned off.

Overall, Tomboy is a nice application; your editor's biggest complaint would be that its memory footprint is huge - even by GNOME standards. The use of Mono cannot help in this regard; it is hard to imagine which features in an application like this would really need the Mono framework for their implementation. With a bit less baggage, Tomboy would be nearly perfect.

BasKet

Finally, your editor played with BasKet, a KDE application which celebrated its 1.0 release on February 12.

Unlike other note-taking applications, BasKet does all of its work within a single window. At the top level, it maintains a tree of "baskets," each of which can contain any number of notes. Only one "basket" can be viewed at any given time. Baskets can be configured with up to three columns; notes are then lined up in the columns. There is also a free-format mode, where notes can be placed anywhere, even on top of each other. In your editor's opinion, the proper metaphor might be a bulletin board - each "basket" is a place where any number of things can be pinned and organized.

BasKet offers a great deal of control over fonts, sizes, weights, and so on. There is a mechanism for attaching tags to notes; each tag brings with it an icon and, perhaps, a set of heavy-handed color choices. Tagging an item as "work," for example, turns the text a sort of dark yellow color. There is an "insert image" operation which yields an empty note and a dialog on how BasKet cannot do image editing. Dragging an image over from konqueror does the expected thing - though your editor remains a little mystified by the concept of "moving" (as opposed to "copying") an image into the application. Baskets can also contain links, application launchers, and other surprises.

The end result of all this stuff is that the BasKet window quickly turns into a gaudy mess of wild colors and images. If your editor's word is not sufficient on this fact, the BasKet screenshots page should dispel any doubt. The BasKet developers are also enamored of animated effects, tooltips, and the use of audio signals.

The display of any given basket can be narrowed to items marked with a given tag. There is also a simple search mechanism which shows only the notes containing a given string. No regular expressions are supported, and the search only applies to the currently-displayed basket by default - though there is an option to make it global.

There is a feature by which baskets can be globally bound to shortcut keys, allowing them to be summoned by a single keystroke. Unfortunately, an attempt to play with that feature left your editor with a totally locked keyboard, a situation which made the writing of this article rather more difficult than it otherwise had to be. Logging in over the net and killing BasKet took care of the problem. One assumes this behavior is not part of the original design specification.

Summary

Of the applications reviewed, the first two (xpad and xpostit) are of relatively little interest. They reflect the state of the desktop art as it was several years in the past. Xpad is still a useful application, but it has been surpassed by others.

BasKet is an interesting attempt to do new things with notes. For your editor's needs, however, it is overkill. The whole point of note taking is to collect ideas together, track things to do, etc. It doesn't need images, colors, animations, sounds, and so on. BasKet seems to be more directly aimed at people who care about making their notes collections look cool. Your editor, who gave up any hope of looking cool back in high school, does not need BasKet's features.

That leaves KNotes and Tomboy. Either is an entirely capable application. The Tomboy feature set still seems like it is most directly focused on the note-taking application; the search feature is nicer to use and linking between notes is useful. But one could get the job done quite nicely with either of these applications.

Comments (47 posted)

Avoiding the tar pit

This Washington Post article is one of many expressing disappointment with Microsoft's Vista release, which is famously late and which has failed to live up to Microsoft's early promises. The article claims that the problems are not specific to Microsoft:

In this context, it behooves us to ask: is there a free software tar pit in our future? What can we do to avoid a grim future where we bog down, our software collapsing under its own weight?

Looking at the state of the free software community now, it is tempting to say that, so far, we have nicely avoided the tar pit. But have we? Here are a few dates from the past which may be of interest:

• The 2.2.0 kernel was released on January 26, 1999.
• 2.4.0 came out on January 4, 2001.
• 2.5.1 - the beginning of the next development series - was released on December 16, 2001

The 2.5 development series was stalled for almost one full year while 2.4 reached a state which actually approached stable. Overall, the process from 2.2.0 to a stable 2.4 took almost three years; the kernel was in a "feature freeze" state for about two of those years. This was a time when quite a few people - many of them kernel developers - felt let down by the development process. This, your editor would attest, was a tar pit era.

One might well argue that the kernel has not yet escaped that tar pit. Like Vista, we lack a shiny new next-generation filesystem; the only credible attempt at such a filesystem (reiser4) remains in a stalled, feature-reduced state. It seems likely, however, that most observers would agree that the tar pit has been left far behind. The kernel development process has been humming along at a high pace, delivering interesting new releases every few months. The same story can be seen in many other parts of the free software community.

If we accept that things have gotten better, it can be interesting to look at why. One hint can be found in the same article:

Any successful free software project must get good at fixing potholes; in the worst case, users (and distributors) will do the job for themselves. In a well-managed project, the people who are trying to improve the whole world will not get in the way of the pothole fixers. There is no single team, charged with all the development on a project, which can get bogged down in that way.

A "well-managed project" must find a way to keep whole-world improvements from stopping everything else, however. The older, multi-year kernel process did not always succeed on that front; the attempt to improve the entire kernel ended up bogging down the entire process. The new kernel development model, with its short release cycles, has caused some developers to complain that it is no longer possible to make major changes that require a long time to settle down. To the extent that this complaint is true, it should maybe be seen as a good thing. By only merging changes which can be brought to a releasable state within a month or two, the new process sidesteps the tar pit and keeps the development machine running.

One of the key suggestions in The Mythical Man Month is the formation of "surgical teams" to support the lead programmer(s). Some of the team members - such as the clerk who "keys in" the code - seem a little quaint now. But the idea that the people running the project (or parts of it) need lieutenants, documentation writers, tool makers, etc. still makes a lot of sense. Once upon a time, the kernel lacked much of that structure, with everything concentrating on a single developer - Linus Torvalds. Now there is a vast network of lieutenants. Quite a few developers focus their effort not on the kernel, but on the tools used by kernel developers. All that's missing are the clerks - and, perhaps, the documentation writers.

One of the biggest anti-tar pit technologies used by the free software community would have been hard for Mr. Brooks to imagine back in 1972: multiple, independent development teams. Any project of any size has a wide range of independent, sometimes conflicting development efforts happening at the same time. If one group bogs down, the others continue unhindered. The process may seem inefficient, given that a significant portion of the work which is done may never survive to a stable release. Throwing away code can be painful, but it is far less so than throwing away the entire project.

Peer review is also missing from the Brooks landscape. But peer review helps to ensure one of the things he thought was vital for a successful project: a clear conceptual architecture for the project. That architecture may take a surprising form: few free software projects have the sort of extensive design documentation that he probably had in mind. But a crowd of reviewers can help to ensure that new code is consistent with the principles behind a project - and that it is maintainable into the future. In this context, it is notable (and worrisome) that an increasing number of proposed kernel features are finding themselves stalled by a lack of reviews.

Finally, one should note that free software projects have mostly learned a sure-fire way to avoid a failure to live up to their promises: they don't make any. Vaporware tends to be scarce in this community; either the code exists or it does not. Very few projects are truly controlled by one corporation, so companies are also restrained in the promises they make about future releases; they are in no position to ensure that those promises are fulfilled. The relative freedom from marketing-driven promises helps free software projects avoid disappointments - but it also helps them to focus effort on objectives with a reasonable chance of success.

To argue that the free software community is immune to the problems of large-scale software development would be foolish. For all their growth, many or most components of a system like Linux are still a fraction of the size of their equivalents on certain proprietary systems. As our code base grows, there will undoubtedly be new challenges for those who would continue to develop it. But the free systems we have today must certainly far exceed the size of System/360 when Mr. Brooks was managing it, and we would appear to be going strong. With widespread community participation, improving tools, and the willingness to change our development models in response to real-world problems, we should be about to stay out of that tar pit for some time yet.

Comments (57 posted)

Page editor: Jonathan Corbet

Security

Linux botnets

Collections of subverted machines, called botnets are typically associated with Windows; thousands of zombie desktops sending spam and causing other internet mayhem. Unfortunately, it is increasingly clear that Linux boxes (as well as MacOS X and other UNIX boxes) are participating in botnets, but in a bit of a twist, it is mostly servers that have been subverted. Botnets are an enormous problem that Vint Cerf recently estimated may involve up to one quarter of all internet connected computers. This translates to a botnet controller's fondest wish: 150 million zombie machines to rent to the highest bidder.

Desktops are usually infected with a bot by an email-borne virus or a trojan attached to some application that the user installs, much like adware and spyware infect machines. The bot software then connects to a 'command and control' (C&C) infrastructure, that often use Internet Relay Chat (IRC) servers, to get instructions on what they should do. The 'owner' of a botnet (known as a bot herder) can then instruct the bots to do whatever they, or more likely their client, want. Because the traffic generated from a botnet comes from all over the Internet, it is difficult or impossible to recognize it for what it is. This allows botnets to be used for spamming, distributed denial of service (DDOS) attacks, click fraud and other malicious activities in a largely untraceable way.

The desktop infection methods are not typically as useful for Linux boxes and so bot herders have turned to web application exploits as a means for collecting subverted machines. Attacking servers has the additional advantage that they are usually machines with much greater resources: faster network connectivity, more storage, faster processors, etc. The attacks are largely targeted at everyone's favorite Internet security whipping boy, PHP applications. Open source PHP applications are the main target as they are ubiquitous and typically easy to exploit as some recent research indicates. An additional benefit of targeting a higher level application is that it is a cross-platform exploit; the operating system and web server software are immaterial if the target is a PHP application.

The easiest type of vulnerability to exploit is often Remote File Inclusion (RFI) which allows an attacker to run code on a vulnerable server with the permissions of the webserver. Generally, those permissions are sufficient to allow the bot to do anything the herder might wish it to; sending email and other network traffic is not normally a privileged activity. Even a cursory glance at the Bugtraq mailing list will reveal numerous RFI vulnerabilities; they are reported regularly and each can lead to bot exploitation if not patched.

Many different types of malware can be installed on a vulnerable machine, depending on the intent of the herder. As with the exploit itself, the installed code tends to be written in a scripting language so that it is cross-platform. The malware can range from simple test tools that indicate vulnerable servers to sophisticated shells that allow the attacker to effectively login to the server and perform any allowed operation.

The most serious damage that these botnets have caused is to our inbox; bots seem to be the preferred way to deliver spam these days. Diligent anti-spam efforts tend to get spamming accounts or systems shut down within hours but there is no easy way to shut down a spam-delivering botnet. A less visible, but potentially more damaging effect is DDOS attacks on internet sites. By attacking a site and working their way up the chain of DNS servers and registrars, a botnet can silence a site the herder does not like or hold sites hostage until they pay a ransom.

Past efforts to thwart botnets have often focused on destroying the C&C servers by shutting down the affected IRC sites, but botnets are moving toward using HTTP for C&C which allows that traffic to hide amongst the sea of similar traffic; it also has the advantage of getting through most firewalls. Botnets will be a serious problem going forward, and Linux systems are not immune to participation in them. The financial incentive is large and the means of prevention are weak, at least so far. As we have learned by trying to deal with spam, money makes our adversaries much more inventive which makes long-term solutions hard to come by.

Comments (31 posted)

Security news

An update on the Solaris telnet vulnerability

For those who are interested in the Solaris telnet vulnerability, Gadi Evron has put together a comprehensive summary of the problem, how Sun responded, where to get fixes, etc. "Whatever my thoughts are on how silly, sad or funny this vulnerability is (quaint really), how they use telnet (?!) and how Sun should be smacked on the back of the head for it, I have to honestly admit Sun's response and the level they were open to the community and industry on this without too many PR/legal blocks getting in their way are very encouraging..."

Full Story (comments: 5)

New vulnerabilities

ImageMagick: buffer overflow

Package(s):	imagemagick	CVE #(s):	CVE-2007-0770
Created:	February 12, 2007	Updated:	February 16, 2007
Description:	Vladimir Nadvornik discovered a buffer overflow in GraphicsMagick and ImageMagick allows user-assisted attackers to cause a denial of service and possibly execute execute arbitrary code via a PALM image that is not properly handled by the ReadPALMImage function in coders/palm.c.
Alerts:	SuSE SUSE-SR:2007:003 2007-02-16 Ubuntu USN-422-1 2007-02-15 Debian DSA-1260-1 2007-02-14 Mandriva MDKSA-2007:041 2006-02-09

Comments (1 posted)

MoinMoin: cross-site scripting

Package(s):	moinmoin	CVE #(s):	CVE-2007-0857
Created:	February 12, 2007	Updated:	February 14, 2007
Description:	Multiple cross-site scripting (XSS) vulnerabilities in MoinMoin before 1.5.7 allow remote attackers to inject arbitrary web script or HTML via (1) the page info, or the page name in a (2) AttachFile, (3) RenamePage, or (4) LocalSiteMap action.
Alerts:	Ubuntu USN-421-1 2007-02-10

Comments (none posted)

rar: buffer overflow

Package(s):	rar	CVE #(s):	CVE-2007-0855
Created:	February 14, 2007	Updated:	February 14, 2007
Description:	The rar archive utility contains a buffer overflow in its processing of password-protected archives. Version 3.7.3 contains the fix.
Alerts:	Gentoo 200702-04 2007-02-13

Comments (none posted)

smb4k: multiple vulnerabilities

Package(s):	smb4k	CVE #(s):	CVE-2007-0472 CVE-2007-0473 CVE-2007-0474 CVE-2007-0475
Created:	February 13, 2007	Updated:	March 12, 2007
Description:	The Smb4K 0.8.0 release announcement notes that several security weaknesses in the utility programs (stack overflows / the use of strcpy instead of strncpy / a design error in smb4k_kill) and in the Smb4KFileIO class (use of mktemp instead of mkstemp for creation of the temporary files which could lead to both a race and an information leak / a race in the code that handles the lock file). Fixes for all of these issues are included in Smb4K 0.8.0 and in the patches that have been prepared for Smb4K 0.7.5 and 0.6.10a. Other versions are not supported anymore.
Alerts:	Gentoo 200703-09 2007-03-09 Mandriva MDKSA-2007:042 2007-02-12

Comments (none posted)

snort: denial of service

Package(s):	snort	CVE #(s):	CVE-2006-6931
Created:	February 14, 2007	Updated:	March 1, 2007
Description:	From the Gentoo advisory: Randy Smith, Christian Estan and Somesh Jha discovered that the rule matching algorithm of Snort can be exploited in a way known as a "backtracking attack" to perform numerous time-consuming operations. Version 2.6.1.2 contains the fix.
Alerts:	Mandriva MDKSA-2007:051 2006-02-28 Gentoo 200702-03 2007-02-13

Comments (none posted)

twiki: arbitrary code execution

Package(s):	twiki	CVE #(s):	CVE-2007-0669
Created:	February 12, 2007	Updated:	February 14, 2007
Description:	According to this vendor security advisory, a vulnerability exists in the SessionPlugin extension of the Wiki engine TWiki, version up to and including 4.1.0. The vulnerability allows local users to cause TWiki to execute arbitrary Perl code with the privileges of the web server process by creating CGI session files on the local filesystem.
Alerts:	OpenPKG OpenPKG-SA-2007.009 2007-02-12

Comments (none posted)

wordpress: multiple vulnerabilities

Package(s):	wordpress	CVE #(s):	CVE-2007-0262 CVE-2007-0539 CVE-2007-0541
Created:	February 13, 2007	Updated:	February 14, 2007
Description:	Wordpress does not properly verify that the m parameter value has the string data type, which allows remote attackers to obtain sensitive information via an invalid m[] parameter, as demonstrated by obtaining the path, and obtaining certain SQL information such as the table prefix. (CVE-2007-0262) WordPress before 2.1 allows remote attackers to cause a denial of service (bandwidth or thread consumption) via pingback service calls with a source URI that corresponds to a large file, which triggers a long download session without a timeout constraint. (CVE-2007-0539) WordPress allows remote attackers to determine the existence of arbitrary files, and possibly read portions of certain files, via pingback service calls with a source URI that corresponds to a local pathname, which triggers different fault codes for existing and non-existing files, and in certain configurations causes a brief file excerpt to be published as a blog comment. (CVE-2007-0541)
Alerts:	Debian-Testing DTSA-33-1 2007-02-12

Comments (none posted)

Updated vulnerabilities

apache: cross-site scripting

Package(s):	apache	CVE #(s):	CVE-2006-3918
Created:	August 9, 2006	Updated:	April 4, 2008
Description:	From the Red Hat advisory: "A bug was found in Apache where an invalid Expect header sent to the server was returned to the user in an unescaped error message. This could allow an attacker to perform a cross-site scripting attack if a victim was tricked into connecting to a site and sending a carefully crafted Expect header."
Alerts:	SuSE SUSE-SA:2008:021 2008-04-04 Ubuntu USN-575-1 2008-02-04 SuSE SUSE-SA:2006:051 2006-09-08 Debian DSA-1167-1 2005-09-04 Red Hat RHSA-2006:0619-01 2006-08-10 Red Hat RHSA-2006:0618-01 2006-08-08

Comments (none posted)

bcfg2: local password disclosure

Package(s):	bcfg2	CVE #(s):
Created:	February 1, 2007	Updated:	February 7, 2007
Description:	The bcfg2 configuration file has incorrect permissions, this can be used for a local password disclosure to unprivileged users.
Alerts:	Debian-Testing DTSA-32-1 2007-02-01

Comments (none posted)

bind: denial of service

Package(s):	bind	CVE #(s):	CVE-2007-0493 CVE-2007-0494
Created:	January 26, 2007	Updated:	March 14, 2007
Description:	The bind package is vulnerable to two remote denial of service attacks in which attackers can cause the bind daemon to to crash or exit unexpectedly by providing malformed data to the daemon in a DNS request.
Alerts:	Red Hat RHSA-2007:0057-02 2007-03-14 Gentoo 200702-06 2007-02-17 Red Hat RHSA-2007:0044-01 2007-02-06 Ubuntu USN-418-1 2007-02-05 Trustix TSLSA-2007-0005 2007-02-05 Mandriva MDKSA-2007:030 2006-01-30 SuSE SUSE-SA:2007:014 2007-01-30 Fedora FEDORA-2007-147 2007-01-29 Debian DSA-1254-1 2007-01-27 OpenPKG OpenPKG-SA-2007.007 2007-01-29 Slackware SSA:2007-026-01 2007-01-29 rPath rPSA-2007-0021-1 2007-01-25

Comments (none posted)

bluez-utils: hidd vulnerability

Package(s):	bluez-utils	CVE #(s):	CVE-2006-6899
Created:	January 16, 2007	Updated:	May 14, 2007
Description:	hidd in BlueZ (bluez-utils) before 2.25 allows remote attackers to obtain control of the Mouse and Keyboard Human Interface Device (HID) via a certain configuration of two HID (PSM) endpoints, operating as a server, aka HidAttack.
Alerts:	Red Hat RHSA-2007:0065-01 2007-05-14 Ubuntu USN-413-1 2007-01-24 Mandriva MDKSA-2007:014 2006-01-15

Comments (none posted)

bugzilla: multiple vulnerabilities

Package(s):	bugzilla	CVE #(s):	CVE-2006-5453 CVE-2006-5454 CVE-2006-5455
Created:	November 10, 2006	Updated:	August 28, 2007
Description:	Bugzilla has the following vulnerabilities: Input data passed to various fields is not properly sanitized before being passed back to users. Users can gain unauthorized access to read attachment descriptions while using diff mode. HTTP GET and HTTP POST requests can be used to perform unauthorized actions due to improper verification. Input that is passed to showdependencygraph.cgi is not properly sanitized before being returned to users.
Alerts:	Debian DSA-1208-1 2006-11-11 Gentoo 200611-04 2006-11-09

Comments (none posted)

busybox: insecure password generation

Package(s):	busybox	CVE #(s):	CVE-2006-1058
Created:	May 5, 2006	Updated:	May 2, 2007
Description:	The BusyBox 1.1.1 passwd command does not use a proper salt when generating passwords. This would create an instance where a brute force attack could take very little time.
Alerts:	Red Hat RHSA-2007:0244-02 2007-05-01 Fedora FEDORA-2006-511 2006-05-04 Fedora FEDORA-2006-510 2006-05-04

Comments (2 posted)

cpio: arbitrary code execution

Package(s):	cpio	CVE #(s):	CVE-2005-4268
Created:	January 2, 2006	Updated:	May 8, 2007
Description:	Richard Harms discovered that cpio did not sufficiently validate file properties when creating archives. Files with e. g. a very large size caused a buffer overflow. By tricking a user or an automatic backup system into putting a specially crafted file into a cpio archive, a local attacker could probably exploit this to execute arbitrary code with the privileges of the target user (which is likely root in an automatic backup system).
Alerts:	rPath rPSA-2007-0094-1 2007-05-07 Red Hat RHSA-2007:0245-02 2007-05-01 Ubuntu USN-234-1 2006-01-02

Comments (none posted)

Cyrus-SASL: DIGEST-MD5 Pre-Authentication Denial of Service

Package(s):	cyrus-sasl	CVE #(s):	CVE-2006-1721
Created:	April 21, 2006	Updated:	September 4, 2007
Description:	Cyrus-SASL contains an unspecified vulnerability in the DIGEST-MD5 process that could lead to a Denial of Service. An attacker could possibly exploit this vulnerability by sending specially crafted data stream to the Cyrus-SASL server, resulting in a Denial of Service even if the attacker is not able to authenticate.
Alerts:	Red Hat RHSA-2007:0878-01 2007-09-04 Red Hat RHSA-2007:0795-01 2007-09-04 SuSE SUSE-SA:2006:025 2006-05-05 Fedora FEDORA-2006-515 2006-05-04 Debian DSA-1042-1 2006-04-25 Mandriva MDKSA-2006:073 2006-04-24 Ubuntu USN-272-1 2006-04-24 Gentoo 200604-09 2006-04-21

Comments (none posted)

dbus: denial of service

Package(s):	dbus	CVE #(s):	CVE-2006-6107
Created:	December 15, 2006	Updated:	February 12, 2007
Description:	Unspecified vulnerability in the match_rule_equal function in bus/signals.c in D-Bus before 1.0.2 allows local applications to remove match rules for other applications and cause a denial of service (lost process messages).
Alerts:	rPath rPSA-2006-0233-1 2007-02-09 Red Hat RHSA-2007:0008-01 2007-02-08 Ubuntu USN-401-1 2007-01-04 OpenPKG OpenPKG-SA-2006.041 2006-12-21 Fedora FEDORA-2006-1475 2006-12-19 Mandriva MDKSA-2006:233 2006-12-18 Fedora FEDORA-2006-1464 2006-12-14

Comments (none posted)

dovecot: index cache file handling error

Package(s):	dovecot	CVE #(s):	CVE-2006-5973
Created:	November 29, 2006	Updated:	May 8, 2007
Description:	The dovecot IMAP server has an error in its index cache file handling code which could be exploited by an authenticated user to execute arbitrary code. Only servers with the (non-default) mmap_disable=yes option setting are vulnerable.
Alerts:	Fedora FEDORA-2006-1504 2006-12-27 Fedora FEDORA-2006-1396 2006-12-18 rPath rPSA-2006-0220-1 2006-11-30 Ubuntu USN-387-1 2006-11-28

Comments (none posted)

fetchmail: password disclosure and DOS

Package(s):	fetchmail	CVE #(s):	CVE-2006-5867 CVE-2006-5974
Created:	January 9, 2007	Updated:	March 16, 2007
Description:	Fetchmail suffers from a password disclosure vulnerability due to a failure to use secure protocols (advisory) and a denial of service vulnerability (advisory).
Alerts:	SuSE SUSE-SR:2007:004 2007-03-16 Debian DSA-1259-1 2007-02-14 Red Hat RHSA-2007:0018-01 2007-01-31 Slackware SSA:2007-024-01 2007-01-25 Gentoo 200701-13 2007-01-22 Fedora FEDORA-2007-042 2007-01-16 Fedora FEDORA-2007-041 2007-01-16 Mandriva MDKSA-2007:016 2006-01-15 Ubuntu USN-405-1 2007-01-11 rPath rPSA-2007-0003-1 2007-01-09 OpenPKG OpenPKG-SA-2007.004 2007-01-08

Comments (none posted)

ffmpeg: buffer overflows

Package(s):	ffmpeg	CVE #(s):	CVE-2006-4799 CVE-2006-4800
Created:	September 14, 2006	Updated:	May 28, 2007
Description:	the AVI processing code in FFmpeg has a number of buffer overflow vulnerabilities. If an attacker can trick a user into loading a specially crafted crafted AVI, arbitrary code can be executed with the user's privileges.
Alerts:	Gentoo 200609-09 2006-09-13

Comments (2 posted)

Mozilla stuff: multiple vulnerabilities

Package(s):	firefox thunderbird seamonkey	CVE #(s):	CVE-2006-6497 CVE-2006-6498 CVE-2006-6501 CVE-2006-6502 CVE-2006-6503 CVE-2006-6504 CVE-2006-6505
Created:	December 20, 2006	Updated:	March 12, 2007
Description:	The Mozilla Project has released new versions of firefox, thunderbird, and seamonkey to address the usual pile of security issues; see this announcement or this CERT advisory for details.
Alerts:	Debian DSA-1265-1 2007-03-10 Debian DSA-1258-1 2007-02-07 Debian DSA-1253-1 2006-01-27 Ubuntu USN-398-4 2007-01-27 SuSE SUSE-SA:2007:006 2007-01-12 Mandriva MDKSA-2007:011 2007-01-11 Mandriva MDKSA-2007:010 2007-01-11 Gentoo 200701-04 2007-01-10 Ubuntu USN-400-1 2007-01-04 Gentoo 200701-03 2007-01-04 Gentoo 200701-02 2007-01-04 Ubuntu USN-398-2 2007-01-03 Ubuntu USN-398-3 2007-01-04 Ubuntu USN-398-1 2007-01-02 Fedora FEDORA-2006-004 2007-01-02 rPath rPSA-2006-0234-2 2006-12-22 SuSE SUSE-SA:2006:080 2006-12-29 Slackware SSA:2006-357-03 2006-12-25 Slackware SSA:2006-357-01 2006-12-25 Slackware SSA:2006-357-02 2006-12-25 rPath rPSA-2006-0234-1 2006-12-22 Fedora FEDORA-2006-1499 2006-12-21 Fedora FEDORA-2006-1491 2006-12-20 Fedora FEDORA-2006-1492 2006-12-20 Red Hat RHSA-2006:0759-01 2006-12-19 Red Hat RHSA-2006:0760-01 2006-12-19 Red Hat RHSA-2006:0758-01 2006-12-19

Comments (none posted)

freeradius: several vulnerabilities

Package(s):	freeradius	CVE #(s):	CVE-2005-4745 CVE-2005-4746
Created:	August 8, 2006	Updated:	April 24, 2007
Description:	Several remote vulnerabilities have been discovered in freeradius, a high-performance RADIUS server, which may lead to SQL injection or denial of service.
Alerts:	Mandriva MDKSA-2007:092 2007-04-23 Debian DSA-1145-1 2006-08-08

Comments (none posted)

freetype: integer overflows

Package(s):	freetype	CVE #(s):	CVE-2006-0747 CVE-2006-1861 CVE-2006-2493 CVE-2006-2661 CVE-2006-3467
Created:	June 8, 2006	Updated:	October 10, 2007
Description:	The FreeType library has several integer overflow vulnerabilities. If a user can be tricked into installing a specially crafted font file, arbitrary code can be executed with the privilege of the user.
Alerts:	Gentoo 200710-09 2007-10-09 Debian DSA-1178-1 2006-09-16 Ubuntu USN-341-1 2006-09-06 Gentoo 200609-04 2006-09-06 rPath rPSA-2006-0157-1 2006-08-25 Mandriva MDKSA-2006:148 2006-08-24 Red Hat RHSA-2006:0635-01 2006-08-21 Red Hat RHSA-2006:0634-01 2006-08-21 Fedora FEDORA-2006-912 2006-08-14 SuSE SUSE-SA:2006:045 2006-08-01 OpenPKG OpenPKG-SA-2006.017 2006-07-28 Ubuntu USN-324-1 2006-07-27 Slackware SSA:2006-207-02 2006-07-27 Mandriva MDKSA-2006:129 2006-07-20 Gentoo 200607-02 2006-07-09 SuSE SUSE-SA:2006:037 2006-06-27 Mandriva MDKSA-2006:099-1 2006-06-13 Mandriva MDKSA-2006:099 2006-06-12 rPath rPSA-2006-0100-1 2006-06-12 Debian DSA-1095-1 2006-06-10 Ubuntu USN-291-1 2006-06-08

Comments (none posted)

ftpd: privilege escalation

Package(s):	ftpd	CVE #(s):	CVE-2006-5778
Created:	November 10, 2006	Updated:	February 14, 2007
Description:	Ftpd is vulnerable to a privilege escalation attack, an incorrect seteuid() call can be used by an FTP user to gain unauthorized access to files or directories.
Alerts:	Gentoo 200611-05:02 2006-11-10 Debian DSA-1217-1 2006-11-20 Gentoo 200611-05 2006-11-10

Comments (none posted)

gcc: file overwrite vulnerability

Package(s):	gcc	CVE #(s):	CVE-2006-3619
Created:	September 6, 2006	Updated:	March 14, 2008
Description:	The fastjar utility found in the GNU compiler collection does not perform adequate file path checking, allowing the creation or overwriting of files outside of the current directory tree.
Alerts:	Mandriva MDVSA-2008:066 2007-03-13 Red Hat RHSA-2007:0473-01 2007-06-11 Red Hat RHSA-2007:0220-02 2007-05-01 Debian DSA-1170-1 2006-09-06

Comments (none posted)

gd: buffer overflow

Package(s):	gd	CVE #(s):	CVE-2007-0455
Created:	February 7, 2007	Updated:	February 28, 2008
Description:	The gd graphics library contains a buffer overflow which could enable a remote attacker to execute arbitrary code. Note that various other packages include code from gd and could also be vulnerable.
Alerts:	Red Hat RHSA-2008:0146-01 2008-02-28 Ubuntu USN-473-1 2007-06-11 OpenPKG OpenPKG-SA-2007.016 2007-05-18 Trustix TSLSA-2007-0007 2007-02-13 Fedora FEDORA-2007-150 2007-02-12 Fedora FEDORA-2007-149 2007-02-12 rPath rPSA-2007-0028-1 2007-02-08 Mandriva MDKSA-2007:038 2006-02-06 Mandriva MDKSA-2007:036 2006-02-06 Mandriva MDKSA-2007:035 2006-02-06

Comments (2 posted)

gdb: buffer overflow

Package(s):	gdb	CVE #(s):	CVE-2006-4146
Created:	September 15, 2006	Updated:	June 12, 2007
Description:	A buffer overflow in dwarfread.c and dwarf2read.c debugging code in GNU Debugger (GDB) 6.5 allows user-assisted attackers, or restricted users, to execute arbitrary code via a crafted file with a location block (DW_FORM_block) that contains a large number of operations.
Alerts:	Red Hat RHSA-2007:0469-01 2007-06-11 Red Hat RHSA-2007:0229-02 2007-05-01 Ubuntu USN-356-1 2006-10-02 Fedora FEDORA-2006-975 2006-09-14

Comments (none posted)

gdm: improper file permissions

Package(s):	gdm	CVE #(s):	CVE-2006-1057
Created:	April 19, 2006	Updated:	May 2, 2007
Description:	The .ICEauthority file may be created with the wrong ownership and permissions; gdm 2.14.2 fixes the problem.
Alerts:	Red Hat RHSA-2007:0286-02 2007-05-01 Mandriva MDKSA-2006:083 2006-05-09 Ubuntu USN-278-1 2006-05-03 Debian DSA-1040-1 2006-04-24 Fedora FEDORA-2006-338 2006-04-19

Comments (none posted)

gnupg: stack overwrite

Package(s):	gnupg	CVE #(s):	CVE-2006-6235
Created:	December 12, 2006	Updated:	March 13, 2007
Description:	A "stack overwrite" vulnerability in GnuPG (gpg) allows attackers to execute arbitrary code via crafted OpenPGP packets that cause GnuPG to dereference a function pointer from deallocated stack memory.
Alerts:	Fedora FEDORA-2007-316 2007-03-12 Fedora FEDORA-2007-315 2007-03-12 SuSE SUSE-SA:2006:075 2006-12-13 Mandriva MDKSA-2006:228 2006-12-11

Comments (3 posted)

gtk2: denial of service

Package(s):	gtk2	CVE #(s):	CVE-2007-0010
Created:	January 24, 2007	Updated:	February 8, 2007
Description:	From the Red Hat advisory: A bug was found in the way the gtk2 GdkPixbufLoader() function processed invalid input. Applications linked against gtk2 could crash if they loaded a malformed image file.
Alerts:	Mandriva MDKSA-2007:039 2007-02-07 Ubuntu USN-415-1 2007-02-01 Debian DSA-1256-1 2007-01-31 SuSE SUSE-SR:2007:002 2007-01-26 rPath rPSA-2007-0019-1 2007-01-25 Red Hat RHSA-2007:0019-02 2007-01-24

Comments (1 posted)

gv: stack-based buffer overflow

Package(s):	gv	CVE #(s):	CVE-2006-5864
Created:	November 20, 2006	Updated:	April 9, 2007
Description:	Stack-based buffer overflow in the ps_gettext function in ps.c for GNU gv 3.6.2, and possibly earlier versions, allows user-assisted attackers to execute arbitrary code via a PostScript (PS) file with certain headers that contain long comments, as demonstrated using the DocumentMedia header.
Alerts:	Gentoo 200704-06 2007-04-06 Gentoo 200703-24 2007-03-26 Debian DSA-1243-1 2006-12-28 Debian DSA-1214-2 2006-12-27 Mandriva MDKSA-2006:229 2006-12-13 rPath rPSA-2006-0230-1 2006-12-12 Fedora FEDORA-2006-1438 2006-12-11 Fedora FEDORA-2006-1437 2006-12-11 Ubuntu USN-390-3 2006-12-06 Ubuntu USN-390-2 2006-12-06 Mandriva MDKSA-2006:214-1 2006-12-04 Ubuntu USN-390-1 2006-11-30 Gentoo 200611-20 2006-11-24 Debian DSA-1214-1 2006-11-20 Mandriva MDKSA-2006:214 2006-11-17

Comments (none posted)

gzip: multiple vulnerabilities

Package(s):	gzip	CVE #(s):	CVE-2006-4334 CVE-2006-4335 CVE-2006-4336 CVE-2006-4337 CVE-2006-4338
Created:	September 19, 2006	Updated:	June 1, 2007
Description:	Tavis Ormandy of the Google Security Team discovered two denial of service flaws in the way gzip expanded archive files. If a victim expanded a specially crafted archive, it could cause the gzip executable to hang or crash. Tavis Ormandy of the Google Security Team discovered several code execution flaws in the way gzip expanded archive files. If a victim expanded a specially crafted archive, it could cause the gzip executable to crash or execute arbitrary code.
Alerts:	Fedora FEDORA-2007-557 2007-05-31 Gentoo 200611-24 2006-11-28 Fedora-Legacy FLSA:211760 2006-11-13 Fedora FEDORA-2006-989 2006-10-10 SuSE SUSE-SA:2006:056 2006-09-26 Gentoo 200609-13 2006-09-23 Trustix TSLSA-2006-0052 2006-09-22 Mandriva MDKSA-2006:167 2006-09-20 Slackware SSA:2006-262-01 2006-09-20 OpenPKG OpenPKG-SA-2006.020 2006-09-20 Debian DSA-1181-1 2006-09-19 rPath rPSA-2006-0170-1 2006-09-19 Ubuntu USN-349-1 2006-09-19 Red Hat RHSA-2006:0667-01 2006-09-19

Comments (1 posted)

horde-kronolith: local file inclusion

Package(s):	horde-kronolith	CVE #(s):	CVE-2006-6175
Created:	January 17, 2007	Updated:	March 7, 2008
Description:	Kronolith contains a mistake in lib/FBView.php where a raw, unfiltered string is used instead of a sanitized string to view local files. An authenticated attacker could craft an HTTP GET request that uses directory traversal techniques to execute any file on the web server as PHP code, which could allow information disclosure or arbitrary code execution with the rights of the user running the PHP application (usually the webserver user).
Alerts:	Gentoo 200701-11 2007-01-16

Comments (none posted)

imagemagick: buffer overflows

Package(s):	imagemagick	CVE #(s):	CVE-2006-5868
Created:	November 28, 2006	Updated:	February 16, 2007
Description:	Daniel Kobras discovered multiple buffer overflows in ImageMagick's SGI file format decoder. By tricking a user or an automated system into processing a specially crafted SGI image, this could be exploited to execute arbitrary code with the user's privileges.
Alerts:	Red Hat RHSA-2007:0015-01 2007-02-15 Mandriva MDKSA-2006:223 2006-12-01 Ubuntu USN-386-1 2006-11-28

Comments (1 posted)

ImageMagick: buffer overflows

Package(s):	ImageMagick	CVE #(s):	CVE-2006-5456
Created:	October 31, 2006	Updated:	March 8, 2007
Description:	Multiple buffer overflows in GraphicsMagick before 1.1.7 and ImageMagick 6.0.7 allow user-assisted attackers to cause a denial of service and possibly execute execute arbitrary code via (1) a DCM image that is not properly handled by the ReadDCMImage function in coders/dcm.c, or (2) a PALM image that is not properly handled by the ReadPALMImage function in coders/palm.c.
Alerts:	Slackware SSA:2007-066-06 2007-03-08 rPath rPSA-2007-0029-1 2007-02-08 rPath rPSA-2006-0218-1 2006-11-27 Gentoo 200611-19 2006-11-24 Fedora FEDORA-2006-1285 2006-11-22 Fedora FEDORA-2006-1286 2006-11-22 Debian DSA-1213-1 2006-11-19 SuSE SUSE-SA:2006:066 2006-11-14 Gentoo 200611-07 2006-11-13 Ubuntu USN-372-1 2006-11-01 Mandriva MDKSA-2006:193 2006-10-30

Comments (2 posted)

imlib2: arbitrary code execution

Package(s):	imlib2	CVE #(s):	CVE-2006-4806 CVE-2006-4807 CVE-2006-4808 CVE-2006-4809
Created:	November 6, 2006	Updated:	August 13, 2007
Description:	M. Joonas Pihlaja discovered that imlib2 did not sufficiently verify the validity of ARGB, JPG, LBM, PNG, PNM, TGA, and TIFF images. If a user were tricked into viewing or processing a specially crafted image with an application that uses imlib2, the flaws could be exploited to execute arbitrary code with the user's privileges.
Alerts:	Mandriva MDKSA-2007:156 2007-08-10 Gentoo 200612-20 2006-12-20 Fedora FEDORA-EXTRAS-2006-004 2006-11-09 Mandriva MDKSA-2006:198-1 2006-11-06 Mandriva MDKSA-2006:198 2006-11-06 Ubuntu USN-376-2 2006-11-06 Ubuntu USN-376-1 2006-11-03

Comments (none posted)

java: multiple vulnerabilities

Package(s):	java	CVE #(s):	CVE-2006-4339 CVE-2006-4790 CVE-2006-6731 CVE-2006-6736 CVE-2006-6737 CVE-2006-6745
Created:	January 18, 2007	Updated:	June 8, 2007
Description:	java has multiple vulnerabilities, these include: an RSA exponent padding attack vulnerability, two vulnerabilities which allow untrusted applets to access data in other applets, vulnerabilities that involve applets gaining privileges due to serialization bugs in the JRE and buffer overflows in the java image handling routines that can give attackers read/write/execute capabilities for local files.
Alerts:	Gentoo 200705-20 2007-05-26 Red Hat RHSA-2007:0073-01 2007-02-09 Red Hat RHSA-2007:0072-01 2007-02-08 Red Hat RHSA-2007:0062-02 2007-02-07 Gentoo 200701-15 2007-01-22 SuSE SUSE-SA:2007:010 2007-01-18

Comments (1 posted)

kdelibs: integer overflow

Package(s):	kdelibs	CVE #(s):	CVE-2006-4811
Created:	October 18, 2006	Updated:	March 5, 2007
Description:	The KDE khtml library can pass untrusted parameters into Qt, allowing a hostile user to trigger an integer overflow there and execute arbitrary code.
Alerts:	Gentoo 200703-06 2007-03-04 Gentoo 200611-02 2006-11-06 Red Hat RHSA-2006:0725-01 2006-11-01 Debian DSA-1200-1 2006-10-30 Slackware SSA:2006-298-01 2006-10-26 rPath rPSA-2006-0195-2 2006-10-18 Mandriva MDKSA-2006:186 2006-10-19 rPath rPSA-2006-0195-1 2006-10-18 Red Hat RHSA-2006:0720-01 2006-10-18

Comments (none posted)

kdelibs: cross-site scripting

Package(s):	kdelibs konqeror	CVE #(s):	CVE-2007-0537
Created:	February 5, 2007	Updated:	August 13, 2007
Description:	Konqueror 3.5.5 does not properly parse HTML comments, which allows remote attackers to conduct cross-site scripting (XSS) attacks and bypass some XSS protection schemes by embedding certain HTML tags within a comment, a related issue to CVE-2007-0478.
Alerts:	Mandriva MDKSA-2007:157 2007-08-10 Gentoo 200703-10 2007-03-10 rPath rPSA-2007-0052-1 2007-03-07 Ubuntu USN-420-1 2007-02-06 Mandriva MDKSA-2007:031 2007-02-02

Comments (none posted)

kernel: multiple vulnerabilities

Package(s):	kernel	CVE #(s):	CVE-2006-5749 CVE-2006-4814 CVE-2006-6106
Created:	January 5, 2007	Updated:	May 7, 2008
Description:	A security issue has been reported in Linux kernel due to an error in drivers/isdn/i4l/isdn_ppp.c as the "isdn_ppp_ccp_reset_alloc_state()" function never initializes an event timer before scheduling it with the "add_timer()" function. The mincore function in the kernel does not properly lock access to user space, which has unspecified impact and attack vectors, possibly related to a deadlock. Another vulnerability has been reported in Linux kernel caused by a boundary error within the handling of incoming CAPI messages in net/bluetooth/cmtp/capi.c. This can be exploited to overwrite certain Kernel data structures.
Alerts:	CentOS CESA-2008:0211 2008-05-07 Red Hat RHSA-2008:0211-01 2008-05-07 Debian DSA-1503 2008-02-22 Debian DSA-1503-2 2008-03-06 SuSE SUSE-SA:2007:035 2007-06-14 SuSE SUSE-SA:2007:053 2007-10-12 Ubuntu USN-416-2 2007-03-01 Ubuntu USN-416-1 2007-02-01 rPath rPSA-2007-0031-1 2007-02-09 Mandriva MDKSA-2007:040 2007-02-07 Red Hat RHSA-2007:0014-01 2007-01-30 Mandriva MDKSA-2007:025 2007-01-23 Fedora FEDORA-2007-058 2007-01-18 Mandriva MDKSA-2007:012 2006-01-12 Trustix TSLSA-2007-0002 2007-01-05

Comments (none posted)

kernel: denial of service

Package(s):	kernel	CVE #(s):	CVE-2006-4623
Created:	October 18, 2006	Updated:	November 14, 2007
Description:	The kernel DVB layer can be caused to crash with maliciously-formatted unidirectional lightweight encapsulation (ULE) data.
Alerts:	Ubuntu USN-489-1 2007-07-19 rPath rPSA-2006-0194-1 2006-10-17

Comments (none posted)

kernel: denial of service

Package(s):	kernel	CVE #(s):	CVE-2006-4535 CVE-2006-4538
Created:	September 18, 2006	Updated:	December 3, 2007
Description:	Sridhar Samudrala discovered a local denial of service vulnerability in the handling of SCTP sockets. By opening such a socket with a special SO_LINGER value, a local attacker could exploit this to crash the kernel. (CVE-2006-4535) Kirill Korotaev discovered that the ELF loader on the ia64 and sparc platforms did not sufficiently verify the memory layout. By attempting to execute a specially crafted executable, a local user could exploit this to crash the kernel. (CVE-2006-4538)
Alerts:	Red Hat RHSA-2007:1049-01 2007-12-03 Mandriva MDKSA-2006:182 2006-10-11 Red Hat RHSA-2006:0689-01 2006-10-05 Debian DSA-1184-2 2006-09-26 Debian DSA-1184-1 2006-09-25 Debian DSA-1183-1 2006-09-25 Ubuntu USN-347-1 2006-09-18

Comments (none posted)

kernel: denial of service by memory consumption

Package(s):	kernel	CVE #(s):	CVE-2006-2936
Created:	July 17, 2006	Updated:	November 14, 2007
Description:	The ftdi_sio driver (usb/serial/ftdi_sio.c) in Linux kernel 2.6.x up to 2.6.17, and possibly later versions, allows local users to cause a denial of service (memory consumption) by writing more data to the serial port than the driver can handle, which causes the data to be queued.
Alerts:	SuSE SUSE-SA:2007:035 2007-06-14 Mandriva MDKSA-2006:151 2006-08-25 Mandriva MDKSA-2006:150 2006-08-25 Ubuntu USN-331-1 2006-08-03 rPath rPSA-2006-0130-1 2006-07-17