Issued:
2012-03-21
Updated:
2012-06-20

RHBA-2012:0409 - xinetd bug fix update

Synopsis

xinetd bug fix update

Type/Severity

Bug Fix Advisory

Topic

An updated xinetd package that fixes multiple bugs is now available for Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6.

Description

The xinetd daemon is a secure replacement for xinetd, the Internet services daemon. The xinetd daemon provides access control for all services based on the address of the remote host, on time of access, or both, and can prevent denial of service (DoS) attacks.

This update fixes the following bugs:

  • Under certain circumstances, the xinetd daemon could become unresponsive (for example, when trying to acquire an already acquired lock for writing to its log file) when an unexpected signal arrived. With this update, the daemon handles unexpected signals correctly and no longer hangs under these circumstances. (BZ#694820)

  • Previously, a bug in the xinetd code could cause corruption of the time_t variable resulting in the following compiler warning:

    warning: dereferencing type-punned pointer will break strict-aliasing rules

A patch has been applied to address this issue, so that the warning no longer occurs. (BZ#697783)

  • Previously, the xinetd daemon ignored the "port" line of the service configuration file, and it was therefore impossible to bind certain RPC services to a specific port. The underlying source code has been modified to ensure that xinetd honors the "port" line, so that the port numbers are now handled appropriately. (BZ#697788)

  • Incorrect use of the realloc() function could cause memory corruption. This resulted in the xinetd daemon terminating unexpectedly right after the start when a large number of services had been configured. The realloc() function has been removed, which ensures that memory corruption no longer occurs in this scenario, and the xinetd daemon starts successfully even when configuring a large number of services. (BZ#711787)

All users of xinetd are advised to upgrade to this updated package, which fixes these bugs.

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 This content is not included.https://access.redhat.com/kb/docs/DOC-11259

Affected Products

ProductVersionArch
Red Hat Enterprise Linux for Scientific Computing6x86_64
Red Hat Enterprise Linux for Power, big endian6ppc64
Red Hat Enterprise Linux for IBM z Systems6s390x
Red Hat Enterprise Linux Workstation6x86_64
Red Hat Enterprise Linux Workstation6i386
Red Hat Enterprise Linux Server6x86_64
Red Hat Enterprise Linux Server6i386
Red Hat Enterprise Linux Server from RHUI6x86_64
Red Hat Enterprise Linux Server from RHUI6i386
Red Hat Enterprise Linux Server - Extended Life Cycle Support6x86_64
Red Hat Enterprise Linux Server - Extended Life Cycle Support6i386
Red Hat Enterprise Linux Server - Extended Life Cycle Support Extension6x86_64
Red Hat Enterprise Linux Server - Extended Life Cycle Support Extension6i386
Red Hat Enterprise Linux Server - Extended Life Cycle Support Extension (for IBM z Systems)6s390x
Red Hat Enterprise Linux Server - Extended Life Cycle Support (for IBM z Systems)6s390x
Red Hat Enterprise Linux Desktop6x86_64
Red Hat Enterprise Linux Desktop6i386

Updated Packages

  • xinetd-debuginfo-2.3.14-34.el6.x86_64.rpm
  • xinetd-debuginfo-2.3.14-34.el6.i686.rpm
  • xinetd-debuginfo-2.3.14-34.el6.ppc64.rpm
  • xinetd-2.3.14-34.el6.ppc64.rpm
  • xinetd-2.3.14-34.el6.i686.rpm
  • xinetd-2.3.14-34.el6.src.rpm
  • xinetd-debuginfo-2.3.14-34.el6.s390x.rpm
  • xinetd-2.3.14-34.el6.x86_64.rpm
  • xinetd-2.3.14-34.el6.s390x.rpm

Fixes

CVEs

(none)

References

(none)

Additional information