CVE-2019-11815 Remote Code Execution affects Linux Kernel prior to 5.0.8

Security experts have found a race condition vulnerability (CVE-2019-11815) in Linux Kernel Prior to 5.0.8 that expose systems to remote code execution.

Linux systems based on kernel versions prior to 5.0.8 are affected by a race condition vulnerability leading to a use after free that could be exploited by hackers to get remote code execution.

Attackers can trigger the race condition issue that resides in the rds_tcp_kill_sock TCP/IP implementation in net/rds/tcp.c to cause a denial-of-service (DoS) condition and to execute code remotely on vulnerable Linux machines.

The vulnerability could be exploited by sending specially crafted TCP packets to vulnerable Linux systems.

The vulnerability tracked as CVE-2019-11815 received a CVSS v3.0 base score of 8.1, it could be abused by unauthenticated attackers without user interaction.

Anyway, the NIST assigned to the vulnerability an exploitability score of 2.2 and an impact score of 5.9 because it is difficult to exploit.

“An issue was discovered in rds_tcp_kill_sock in net/rds/tcp.c in the Linux kernel before 5.0.8. There is a race condition leading to a use-after-free, related to net namespace cleanup.” reads the description provided by Mitre.

The exploitation of the flaw could allow attackers to access resources, modify any files, and deny access to resources.

The development team of Linux kernel already released a security patch that addressed the CVE-2019-11815 flaw at the end of March. The vulnerability was completely fixed with the release of Linux kernel 5.0.8 version.

Below the security advisories published by the major Linux distributions:

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Pierluigi Paganini

(SecurityAffairs – CVE-2019-11815, Linux Kernel)

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Pierluigi Paganini

Pierluigi Paganini is member of the ENISA (European Union Agency for Network and Information Security) Threat Landscape Stakeholder Group and Cyber G7 Group, he is also a Security Evangelist, Security Analyst and Freelance Writer. Editor-in-Chief at "Cyber Defense Magazine", Pierluigi is a cyber security expert with over 20 years experience in the field, he is Certified Ethical Hacker at EC Council in London. The passion for writing and a strong belief that security is founded on sharing and awareness led Pierluigi to find the security blog "Security Affairs" recently named a Top National Security Resource for US. Pierluigi is a member of the "The Hacker News" team and he is a writer for some major publications in the field such as Cyber War Zone, ICTTF, Infosec Island, Infosec Institute, The Hacker News Magazine and for many other Security magazines. Author of the Books "The Deep Dark Web" and “Digital Virtual Currency and Bitcoin”.