Secunia

Description

Red Hat has issued updated packages for tcpdump. These fix a security issue and a vulnerability, which can be exploited by a malicious person to cause a DoS (Denial of Service).

1) The vulnerability is caused due to an unspecified error in the handling of RADIUS packets. This can be exploited by sending a specially crafted packet, which will cause the program to enter an infinite loop.

2) The second issue is not a vulnerability in itself, since it only can be exploited if another vulnerability (eg. boundary error) is present.

The problem is that the previous release of tcpdump didn't drop privileges when executed. Tcpdump would therefore continue running as "root" rather than the less privileged user "pcap".

Solution
Updated packages are only available via Red Hat Network:
Further details available in Customer Area

Original Advisory
http://rhn.redhat.com/errata/RHSA-2003-151.html

Deep Links
Links available in Customer Area