Description
A certain Red Hat configuration step for the qla2xxx driver in the Linux kernel 2.6.18 on Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL) 5, when N_Port ID Virtualization (NPIV) hardware is used, sets world-writable permissions for the (1) vport_create and (2) vport_delete files under /sys/class/scsi_host/, which allows local users to make arbitrary changes to SCSI host attributes by modifying these files.
Fixed in Linux distributions
Distributions backport fixes, so the version that fixes this vulnerability differs per release — upgrade to at least the version shown. From the distributions' security trackers and advisories.
Red Hat
Security tracker ↗| Release | Package | Fixed in | Advisory |
|---|---|---|---|
| RHEL 5 | kernel +11 | 2.6.18-164.11.1.el5 | RHSA-2010:0046 |
Advisories 1
- RHSA-2010:0046 Red Hat Security Advisory: kernel security and bug fix update Red Hat Security Advisories (RHSA) · Jun 29, 2026
References
- [oss-security] 20100120 CVE-2009-3556 kernel: qla2xxx NPIV vport management pseudofiles are world writable mailing-list
- https://bugzilla.redhat.com/show_bug.cgi?id=537177
- http://support.avaya.com/css/P8/documents/100073666
- oval:org.mitre.oval:def:9738 vdb-entry signature
- kernel-qla2xxx-security-bypass(55809) vdb-entry
- SUSE-SA:2010:019 vendor-advisory
- oval:org.mitre.oval:def:6744 vdb-entry signature
- RHSA-2010:0095 vendor-advisory
- RHSA-2010:0046 vendor-advisory