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FreeBSD Hyper-Threading Support Information Disclosure
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Secunia Advisory:
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SA15348
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Release Date:
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2005-05-13
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Last Update:
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2005-05-24
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Popularity:
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15,221 views
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Critical:
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Less critical
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Impact:
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Exposure of sensitive information
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Where:
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Local system
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Solution Status:
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Vendor Patch
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| OS: | FreeBSD 4.x
FreeBSD 5.x
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Subscribe:
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Instant alerts on relevant vulnerabilities 
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| CVE reference: | CVE-2005-0109
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Description:
Colin Percival has reported a vulnerability in FreeBSD, which can be exploited by malicious, local users to gain knowledge of sensitive information.
The vulnerability is caused due to a design error in the Hyper-Threading Technology (HTT) as threads share various CPU resources including memory caches. This makes it possible for one thread to monitor the execution of another thread and access potentially sensitive information in the shared memory caches (e.g. cryptographic keys used by OpenSSH or SSL-enabled applications).
Successful exploitation requires that the system has a processor with Hyper-Threading support.
Solution:
FreeBSD has issued updated versions and patches and recommend disabling HTT on processors that support it (see vendor advisory for more information).
Fixed versions:
2005-05-13 00:13:00 UTC (RELENG_5, 5.4-STABLE)
2005-05-13 00:13:00 UTC (RELENG_5_4, 5.4-RELEASE-p1)
2005-05-13 00:13:00 UTC (RELENG_5_3, 5.3-RELEASE-p15)
2005-05-13 00:13:00 UTC (RELENG_4, 4.11-STABLE)
2005-05-13 00:13:00 UTC (RELENG_4_11, 4.11-RELEASE-p9)
2005-05-13 00:13:00 UTC (RELENG_4_10, 4.10-RELEASE-p14)
Patch for FreeBSD 4.10:
ftp://ftp.FreeBSD.org/pub/FreeBSD/CERT/patches/SA-05:09/htt410.patch
ftp://ftp.FreeBSD.org/pub/FreeBSD/CERT/patches/SA-05:09/htt410.patch.asc
Patch for FreeBSD 4.11:
ftp://ftp.FreeBSD.org/pub/FreeBSD/CERT/patches/SA-05:09/htt411.patch
ftp://ftp.FreeBSD.org/pub/FreeBSD/CERT/patches/SA-05:09/htt411.patch.asc
Patch for FreeBSD 5.x:
ftp://ftp.FreeBSD.org/pub/FreeBSD/CERT/patches/SA-05:09/htt5.patch
ftp://ftp.FreeBSD.org/pub/FreeBSD/CERT/patches/SA-05:09/htt5.patch.asc
Provided and/or discovered by:
Colin Percival
Changelog:
2005-05-14: Added additional information.
2005-05-24: Added link to US-CERT vulnerability note.
Original Advisory:
FreeBSD:
ftp://ftp.freebsd.org/pub/FreeBSD/CERT/advisories/FreeBSD-SA-05:09.htt.asc
Colin Percival:
http://daemonology.net/hyperthreading-considered-harmful/
Other References:
US-CERT VU#911878:
http://www.kb.cert.org/vuls/id/911878
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Please note: The information that this Secunia Advisory is based on comes from a third party unless stated otherwise.
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