Quick answers
- Is CVE-2016-9401 exploited in the wild?
- No. Junglewise Threat Intelligence has no report of CVE-2016-9401 being exploited in the wild.
- How severe is CVE-2016-9401?
- Medium severity, with a CVSS score of 5.5, published 23 January 2017.
- Which products and versions are affected?
- Debian Linux 8.0; Gnu Bash up to 4.4-patch5.
- Is there a fix for CVE-2016-9401?
- A patch was published on 2017-03-21: Red Hat released security updates (RHSA-2017:0725) Junglewise finds every place you run it, drafts the upgrade and applies it once you approve.
- How is CVE-2016-9401 attacked?
- It is attacked with local access, in an operating system.
- Am I affected by CVE-2016-9401?
- Check whether you run Debian Linux or Gnu Bash at an affected version. Junglewise does that check for you around the clock: connect your code, cloud and domains, and it matches new vulnerabilities like this one against what you actually run and tells you when one reaches you.
Technical details
A use-after-free vulnerability exists in the 'popd' builtin command of GNU Bash. The issue is located in the 'popd_builtin' function within 'pushd.def', where the shell fails to properly validate the index provided in a 'popd' command (e.g., 'popd +-111111'). This allows a local attacker to trigger a free() on an arbitrary or invalid memory address. Exploitation can lead to a denial of service (segmentation fault) or a bypass of restricted shell (rbash) configurations. The vulnerability is addressed in Bash 4.4 and various vendor backports.
Affected products
- GNU Bash up to 4.4-patch5
- Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6, 7
- Debian Debian Linux 8.0
Timeline
- 2016-11-17: disclosed: Public disclosure on oss-security mailing list
- 2016-11-17: advisory: CVE-2016-9401 assigned by MITRE
- 2017-01-23: advisory: NVD publication date
- 2017-03-21: patched: Red Hat released security updates (RHSA-2017:0725)
References
- http://rhn.redhat.com/errata/RHSA-2017-0725.html
- http://www.openwall.com/lists/oss-security/2016/11/17/5
- http://www.openwall.com/lists/oss-security/2016/11/17/9
- http://www.securityfocus.com/bid/94398
- https://access.redhat.com/errata/RHSA-2017:1931
- https://lists.debian.org/debian-lts-announce/2019/03/msg00028.html
- https://security.gentoo.org/glsa/201701-02