Handling critical security vulnerabilities: Three incidents
Going Critical
We look at what makes a security issue critical and how upstream developers and vendors respond by examining three incidents: CVE-2013-0156, CVE-2013-0333, and rubygems.org. incident response handling.
January 2013 was a bit of a rough month for users of Ruby on Rails and rubygems. org. Two critical security flaws were found in Ruby on Rails, and rubygems. org was broken into (luckily, not by a malicious hacker). In this article, I will look at exactly what caused these security vulnerabilities and the break-in to earn “critical” ratings, what the vendors did when a critical issue came up, and what users can do to help keep their software secure.
Critical Issues
One of the most important criteria in judging whether a security issue is critical or not is the severity of exploitation (see the “CVSS2 Scores” box). An attack that allows remote code execution as a privileged user or root is a whole lot worse than a simple denial of service condition. On the other hand, a denial of service that can be triggered remotely with a single network packet and make it through the Internet (e.g., not just on the same local subnet) might also be rated “critical.”
Buy this article as PDF
(incl. VAT)
Buy Linux Magazine
Direct Download
Read full article as PDF:
Price $2.95
Subscribe to our Linux Newsletters
Find Linux and Open Source Jobs
Subscribe to our ADMIN Newsletters
Support Our Work
Linux Magazine content is made possible with support from readers like you. Please consider contributing when you've found an article to be beneficial.
News
-
Linux Mint Finally Receiving Support for Gestures
If you use the Linux Mint Cinnamon desktop, you'll be thrilled to know that 21.2 is getting support for gestures on touchscreen devices and touchpads.
-
An All-Snap Version of Ubuntu is In The Works
Along with the standard deb version of the open-source operating system, Canonical will release an-all snap version.
-
Mageia 9 Beta 2 Ready for Testing
The latest beta of the popular Mageia distribution now includes the latest kernel and plenty of updated applications.
-
KDE Plasma 6 Looks to Bring Basic HDR Support
The KWin piece of KDE Plasma now has HDR support and color management geared for the 6.0 release.
-
Bodhi Linux 7.0 Beta Ready for Testing
The latest iteration of the Bohdi Linux distribution is now available for those who want to experience what's in store and for testing purposes.
-
Changes Coming to Ubuntu PPA Usage
The way you manage Personal Package Archives will be changing with the release of Ubuntu 23.10.
-
AlmaLinux 9.2 Now Available for Download
AlmaLinux has been released and provides a free alternative to upstream Red Hat Enterprise Linux.
-
An Immutable Version of Fedora Is Under Consideration
For anyone who's a fan of using immutable versions of Linux, the Fedora team is currently considering adding a new spin called Fedora Onyx.
-
New Release of Br OS Includes ChatGPT Integration
Br OS 23.04 is now available and is geared specifically toward web content creation.
-
Command-Line Only Peropesis 2.1 Available Now
The latest iteration of Peropesis has been released with plenty of updates and introduces new software development tools.