4.3 - RHSA-2012:1037

Problem Description:

Updated postgresql84 and postgresql packages that fix two security issues are now available for Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5 and 6 respectively.

The Red Hat Security Response Team has rated this update as having moderate security impact. Common Vulnerability Scoring System (CVSS) base scores, which give detailed severity ratings, are available for each vulnerability from the CVE links in the References section.

2. Relevant releases/architectures:

RHEL Desktop Workstation (v. 5 client) - i386, x86_64 Red Hat Enterprise Linux (v. 5 server) - i386, ia64, ppc, s390x, x86_64 Red Hat Enterprise Linux Desktop (v. 5 client) - i386, x86_64 Red Hat Enterprise Linux Desktop (v. 6) - i386, x86_64 Red Hat Enterprise Linux Desktop Optional (v. 6) - i386, x86_64 Red Hat Enterprise Linux HPC Node (v. 6) - x86_64 Red Hat Enterprise Linux HPC Node Optional (v. 6) - x86_64 Red Hat Enterprise Linux Server (v. 6) - i386, ppc64, s390x, x86_64 Red Hat Enterprise Linux Workstation (v. 6) - i386, x86_64

3. Description:

PostgreSQL is an advanced object-relational database management system (DBMS).

A flaw was found in the way the crypt() password hashing function from the optional PostgreSQL pgcrypto contrib module performed password transformation when used with the DES algorithm. If the password string to be hashed contained the 0x80 byte value, the remainder of the string was ignored when calculating the hash, significantly reducing the password strength. This made brute-force guessing more efficient as the whole password was not required to gain access to protected resources. (CVE-2012-2143)

Note: With this update, the rest of the string is properly included in the DES hash; therefore, any previously stored password values that are affected by this issue will no longer match. In such cases, it will be necessary for those stored password hashes to be updated.

A denial of service flaw was found in the way the PostgreSQL server performed a user privileges check when applying SECURITY DEFINER or SET attributes to a procedural language's (such as PL/Perl or PL/Python) call handler function. A non-superuser database owner could use this flaw to cause the PostgreSQL server to crash due to infinite recursion. (CVE-2012-2655)

Upstream acknowledges Rubin Xu and Joseph Bonneau as the original reporters of the CVE-2012-2143 issue.

These updated packages upgrade PostgreSQL to version 8.4.12, which fixes these issues as well as several non-security issues. Refer to the PostgreSQL Release Notes for a full list of changes:

http://www.postgresql.org/docs/8.4/static/release.html

All PostgreSQL users are advised to upgrade to these updated packages, which correct these issues. If the postgresql service is running, it will be automatically restarted after installing this update.

4. Solution:

Before applying this update, make sure all previously-released errata relevant to your system have been applied.

This update is available via the Red Hat Network. Details on how to use the Red Hat Network to apply this update are available at https://access.redhat.com/knowledge/articles/11258

5. Bugs fixed (http://bugzilla.redhat.com/):

816956 - CVE-2012-2143 BSD crypt(): DES encrypted password weakness 825995 - CVE-2012-2655 postgresql: Ability of database owners to install procedural languages via CREATE LANGUAGE found unsafe (DoS)