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ESX Server 3.0.0, Patch ESX-3003211: Security Update to Prevent Overwriting of Arbitrary Files

Details

Resolved Issues

A possible security issue with GNU tar 1.16 and 1.15.1, and possibly other versions, might allow user-assisted attackers to overwrite arbitrary files via a tar file that contains a GNUTYPE_NAMES record with a symbolic link, which is not properly handled by the extract_archive function in extract.c and extract_mangle function in mangle.c, a variant of CVE-2002-1216. The Common Vulnerabilities and Exposures project (cve.mitre.org) assigned the name CVE-2006-6097 to this issue.

Solution

Applicability

This patch is for ESX Server 3.0.0 only. For the ESX Server 3.0.1 patch, refer to http://kb.vmware.com/kb/5031800.

Installing the Patch

Download Instructions

Download and verify the patch bundle as follows:

  2. Log into the ESX Server service console as root.
  3. Create a local depot directory.

    # mkdir /var/updates

    Note: VMware recommends you use the updates directory.
  4. Change your working directory to /var/updates.

    # cd /var/updates

  5. Download the tar file into the /var/updates directory.
  6. Verify the integrity of the downloaded tar file.

    # md5sum ESX-3003211.tgz

    The md5 checksum output should match the following:

    846fb515a9786646dc886cef8f09eac0 ESX-3003211.tgz

  7. Extract the compressed tar archive.

    # tar -xvzf ESX-3003211.tgz

  8. Change to the newly created directory, /var/updates/ESX-3003211.

    # cd ESX-3003211

Installation Instructions

Note: There is no need to shut down the virtual machines on the host or to migrate them using VMotion before applying the patch. No reboot of the ESX Server host is required after applying this patch.
 
After you have downloaded and extracted the archive, and if you are in the directory you created above, install the update using the following command:

# esxupdate update

If you want to run esxupdate from a different directory, you must specify the bundle path in the command:

# esxupdate -r file://<directory>/ESX-3003211 update

For example, if the host is called depot:

# esxupdate –r file:///depot/var/updates/ESX-3003211 update

During the update process, logs appear on the terminal. You can specify the verbosity of esxupdate logs by using the -v option as shown below:

# esxupdate -v 10 -r file://<directory>/ESX-3003211 update

For more information on using esxupdate, please refer to the Patch Management for ESX Server 3 tech note at http://www.vmware.com/pdf/esx3_esxupdate.pdf.

Keywords

esx300;esxpatch;alertz

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  • KB Article: 3003211
  • Updated: Jul 9, 2007
  • Products:
    VMware ESX
  • Product Versions:
    VMware ESX 3.0.x