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Debian apt security update: man-in-the-middle arbitrary code execution

47 points • by vesinisa • today at 12:46 PM • 39 comments • view on HN

Comments

iamnothere • today at 1:57 PM

Bonus, the man in the middle can see what packages you’re downloading since you’re not using HTTPS, so they know if you’re vulnerable during an update.

I never understood the insistence on using HTTP as a default for apt. Once HTTPS transport was available and tested (which took forever btw) then it should have become the default. Maybe this will spur some changes.

vesinisa • today at 1:02 PM

No word as of yet if Ubuntu's apt is also impacted.

Sounds like the vulnerability is in the HTTP handling code, and because apt downloads packages over plain HTTP a man-in-the-middle position would be enough to exploit it.

It almost seems like a repeat of two previous apt vulnerabilities:

In 2019: https://lists.debian.org/debian-security-announce/2019/msg00...

And in 2014: https://lists.debian.org/debian-security-announce/2014/msg00...

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greggsy • today at 1:05 PM

> We recommend that you upgrade your apt packages.

Is there a German word for a broken tool that can only be fixed by using the same broken tool?

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serbuvlad • today at 1:26 PM

It's always been strange to me and I've been saying forever that I don't get why package repos don't use HTTPS.

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hypfer • today at 1:49 PM

If I understand correctly, trixie-security contains a fixed version, however, bookworm not (yet)?

Is it going to be fixed for oldstable?

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flotzam • today at 1:30 PM

Would it have killed them to give even a little bit of guidance how to securely update the apt package(s)?

If necessary, with instructions for downloading and verifying it out of band

Or maybe by passing a parameter to the old apt that disables the vulnerable HTTP download resumption when downloading the new apt

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hiddenvulkcan • today at 12:56 PM

Yikes, that vuln in apt is pretty bad! I think a lot of the newer wave of vulnerabilities being found generally seem to have a low likelihood of being reached, but this seems somewhat plausible? I'm assuming this would be done by compromising a mirror, in order to do the redirect?

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InsidiousWombat • today at 1:30 PM

interesting, why is verification not running after package is already on hard drive in full ?

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mariofdistrust • today at 1:15 PM

yey, my computers and containers aren't vulnerable (^-^)

12312987 • today at 1:13 PM

Debian is such a clown show. The SSL fiasco, apt over http, overpatching packages, allowing AI, kicking out packages over some lintian bullshit.

How are you going to update if apt is compromised?

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