What’s Vulnerable › Vulnerabilities
CVE-2010-4258
- Severity: medium (CVSS 6.2 v2.0)
- Exploited in the wild: not listed in CISA KEV
- EPSS: 2.7% probability of exploitation in the next 30 days
- Public exploit or detection template: yes
- Published: 2010-12-30 · updated 2026-06-16
- Weakness: CWE-269
Description
The do_exit function in kernel/exit.c in the Linux kernel before 2.6.36.2 does not properly handle a KERNEL_DS get_fs value, which allows local users to bypass intended access_ok restrictions, overwrite arbitrary kernel memory locations, and gain privileges by leveraging a (1) BUG, (2) NULL pointer dereference, or (3) page fault, as demonstrated by vectors involving the clear_child_tid feature and the splice system call.
Affected products
- Fedoraproject Fedora: 13
- Linux kernel: before 2.6.36.2 — fixed in 2.6.36.2
- Opensuse: 11.2, 11.3
- SUSE Linux Enterprise Server 15 SP1: 10-sp3, 11-sp1
- SUSE Linux Enterprise Real Time Extension: 11-sp1
- SUSE Linux Enterprise Server: 9, 10-sp3, 11-sp1
- SUSE Linux Enterprise Software Development Kit: 10-sp3
How to fix
Upgrade to a fixed version: Linux kernel 2.6.36.2. Check the vendor advisory for mitigations.
References
- http://archives.neohapsis.com/archives/fulldisclosure/2010-12/0086.html
- http://blog.nelhage.com/2010/12/cve-2010-4258-from-dos-to-privesc/
- http://code.google.com/p/chromium-os/issues/detail?id=10234
- http://git.kernel.org/?p=linux/kernel/git/torvalds/linux-2.6.git%3Ba=commit%3Bh=33dd94ae1ccbfb7bf0fb6c692bc3d1c4269e6177
- http://googlechromereleases.blogspot.com/2011/01/chrome-os-beta-channel-update.html
- http://lists.fedoraproject.org/pipermail/package-announce/2010-December/052513.html
- http://lists.opensuse.org/opensuse-security-announce/2011-01/msg00000.html
- http://lists.opensuse.org/opensuse-security-announce/2011-01/msg00001.html
- http://lists.opensuse.org/opensuse-security-announce/2011-01/msg00004.html
- http://lists.opensuse.org/opensuse-security-announce/2011-01/msg00007.html
- http://lists.opensuse.org/opensuse-security-announce/2011-02/msg00000.html
- http://lists.opensuse.org/opensuse-security-announce/2011-02/msg00002.html
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