FreeBSD Hyper-Threading Support Information Disclosure
Secunia Advisory: SA15348
Release Date: 2005-05-13
Last Update: 2005-05-24
Popularity: 15,047 views

Critical:
Less critical
Impact: Exposure of sensitive information
Where: Local system
Solution Status: Vendor Patch

OS:FreeBSD 4.x
FreeBSD 5.x

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CVE reference:CVE-2005-0109


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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