CVE-2021-3715

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Last Modified: UTC

Important Important Impact What does this mean?
7.8 CVSS v3 Base Score

Description

A flaw was found in the "Routing decision" classifier in the Linux kernel's Traffic Control networking subsystem in the way it handled changing of classification filters, leading to a use-after-free condition. This flaw allows unprivileged local users to escalate their privileges on the system. The highest threat from this vulnerability is to confidentiality, integrity, as well as system availability.

Statement

This flaw is rated as having Moderate impact (Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7 and lower) because of the need to have CAP_NET_ADMIN privileges and that Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7 disabled unprivileged user/network namespaces by default.

This flaw is rated as having Important impact (Red Hat Enterprise Linux 8) because Red Hat Enterprise Linux 8 enabled unprivileged user/network namespaces by default which can be used to gain CAP_NET_ADMIN privileges in corresponding user namespace even for otherwise unprivileged local user and thus exercise this vulnerability.

Mitigation

In order to mitigate this issue, it is possible to prevent the affected code from being loaded by blacklisting the kernel module cls_route.ko. For instructions relating to how to blacklist a kernel module refer to: https://access.redhat.com/solutions/41278.

Alternatively, if cls_route is being used, on Red Hat Enterprise Linux 8, you can disable unprivileged user namespaces by setting user.max_user_namespaces to 0:

# echo "user.max_user_namespaces=0" > /etc/sysctl.d/userns.conf
# sysctl -p /etc/sysctl.d/userns.conf

Additional Information

External References

Content from www.cve.org is not included.https://www.cve.org/CVERecord?id=CVE-2021-3715

Content from nvd.nist.gov is not included.https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2021-3715

Content from git.kernel.org is not included.https://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux/kernel/git/torvalds/linux.git/commit/?id=ef299cc3fa1a9e1288665a9fdc8bff55629fd359

Affected Packages and Issued Red Hat Security Errata

Products / Services Components State Errata
Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5 kernel Out of support scope
Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6 kernel Out of support scope
Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7 kernel Fixed RHSA-2021:3438
Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7 kernel-rt Fixed RHSA-2021:3439
Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7 kpatch-patch Fixed RHSA-2021:3441
Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7 kernel-alt Out of support scope
Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7.6 Update Services for SAP Solutions kpatch-patch Fixed RHSA-2022:7173
Red Hat Enterprise Linux 8 kernel Fixed RHSA-2020:4431
Red Hat Enterprise Linux 8 kernel-rt Fixed RHSA-2020:4609
Red Hat Enterprise Linux 8.1 Extended Update Support kpatch-patch Fixed RHSA-2021:3442
Unless explicitly stated as not affected, all previous versions of packages in any minor update stream of a product listed here should be assumed vulnerable, although may not have been subject to full analysis.

Common Vulnerability Scoring System (CVSS) Score Details

Important note

CVSS scores for open source components depend on vendor-specific factors (e.g. version or build chain). Therefore, Red Hat's score and impact rating can be different from NVD and other vendors. Red Hat remains the authoritative CVE Naming Authorities (CNA) source for its products and services (see Red Hat classifications ).

CVSS v3 Score Breakdown Red Hat NVD
CVSS v3 Base Score 7.8 7.8
Attack Vector Local Local
Attack Complexity Low Low
Privileges Required Low Low
User Interaction None None
Scope Unchanged Unchanged
Confidentiality Impact High High
Integrity Impact High High
Availability Impact High High

CVSS v3 Vector

Red Hat CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:H

NVD CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:H

Acknowledgements

Red Hat would like to thank Zhenpeng Lin for reporting this issue.

Frequently Asked Questions

Why is Red Hat's CVSS v3 score or Impact different from other vendors?

 For open source software shipped by multiple vendors, the CVSS base scores may vary for each vendor's version depending on the version they ship, how they ship it, the platform, and even how the software is compiled. This makes scoring of vulnerabilities difficult for third-party vulnerability databases such as NVD that only provide a single CVSS base score for each vulnerability. Red Hat scores reflect how a vulnerability affects our products specifically.

For more information, see https://access.redhat.com/solutions/762393.

My product is listed as "Under investigation" or "Affected", when will Red Hat release a fix for this vulnerability?
  • "Under investigation" doesn't necessarily mean that the product is affected by this vulnerability. It only means that our Analysis Team is still working on determining whether the product is affected and how it is affected.
  • "Affected" means that our Analysis Team has determined that this product is affected by this vulnerability and might release a fix to address this in the near future.

What can I do if my product is listed as "Will not fix"?

 A "will not fix" status means that a fix for an affected product version is not planned or not possible due to complexity, which may create additional risk.

Available options depend mostly on the Impact of the vulnerability and the current Life Cycle phase of your product. Overall, you have the following options:
  • Upgrade to a supported product version that includes a fix for this vulnerability (recommended).
  • Apply a mitigation (if one exists).
  • Open a This content is not included.support case to request a prioritization of releasing a fix for this vulnerability.

What can I do if my product is listed as "Fix deferred"?

 A deferred status means that a fix for an affected product version is not guaranteed due to higher-priority development work.

Available options depend mostly on the Impact of the vulnerability and the current Life Cycle phase of your product. Overall, you have the following options:
  • Apply a mitigation (if one exists).
  • Open a This content is not included.support case to request a prioritization of releasing a fix for this vulnerability.
  • Red Hat Engineering focuses on addressing high-priority issues based on their complexity or limited lifecycle support. Therefore, lower-priority issues will not receive immediate fixes.

What is a mitigation?

 A mitigation is an action that can be taken to reduce the impact of a security vulnerability, without deploying any fixes.

I have a Red Hat product but it is not in the above list, is it affected?

 The listed products were found to include one or more of the components that this vulnerability affects. These products underwent a thorough evaluation to determine their affectedness by this vulnerability. Note that layered products (such as container-based offerings) that consume affected components from any of the products listed in this table may be affected and are not represented.

Why is my security scanner reporting my product as vulnerable to this vulnerability even though my product version is fixed or not affected?

 In order to maintain code stability and compatibility, Red Hat usually does not rebase packages to entirely new versions. Instead, we backport fixes and new features to an older version of the package we distribute. This can result in some security scanners that only consider the package version to report the package as vulnerable. To avoid this, we suggest that you use an approved vulnerability scanner from our This content is not included.Red Hat Vulnerability Scanner Certification program.

My product is listed as "Out of Support Scope". What does this mean?

 When a product is listed as "Out of Support Scope", it means a vulnerability with the impact level assigned to this CVE is no longer covered by its current support lifecycle phase. The product has been identified to contain the impacted component, but analysis to determine whether it is affected or not by this vulnerability was not performed. The product should be assumed to be affected. Customers are advised to apply any mitigation options documented on this page, consider removing or disabling the impacted component, or upgrade to a supported version of the product that has an update available.