#VU34810 Out-of-bounds write in pam_radius and Debian Linux - CVE-2015-9542

Vulnerability identifier: #VU34810

Vulnerability risk: Medium

CVSSv4.0: 6.6 [CVSS:4.0/AV:N/AC:L/AT:N/PR:N/UI:N/VC:N/VI:N/VA:H/SC:N/SI:N/SA:N/E:U/U:Green]

CVE-ID: CVE-2015-9542

CWE-ID: CWE-787

Exploitation vector: Network

Exploit availability: No

Vulnerable software:
pam_radius
Other software / Other software solutions
Debian Linux
Operating systems & Components / Operating system

Vendor: FreeRADIUS
Debian

Description

The vulnerability allows a remote non-authenticated attacker to perform a denial of service (DoS) attack.

add_password in pam_radius_auth.c in pam_radius 1.4.0 does not correctly check the length of the input password, and is vulnerable to a stack-based buffer overflow during memcpy(). An attacker could send a crafted password to an application (loading the pam_radius library) and crash it. Arbitrary code execution might be possible, depending on the application, C library, compiler, and other factors.

Mitigation
Install update from vendor's website.

Vulnerable software versions

pam_radius: 1.4.0

Debian Linux: 1.4.0 - 8.0

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External links
https://bugzilla.redhat.com/show_bug.cgi?id=CVE-2015-9542
https://github.com/FreeRADIUS/pam_radius/commit/01173ec2426627dbb1e0d96c06c3ffa0b14d36d0
https://lists.debian.org/debian-lts-announce/2020/02/msg00023.html
https://lists.debian.org/debian-lts-announce/2020/08/msg00000.html
https://usn.ubuntu.com/4290-1/
https://usn.ubuntu.com/4290-2/

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Q & A

Can this vulnerability be exploited remotely?

Yes. This vulnerability can be exploited by a remote non-authenticated attacker via the Internet.

Is there known malware, which exploits this vulnerability?

No. We are not aware of malware exploiting this vulnerability.