CVE-2019-18425

CRITICAL

Xen < 4.12.1 - 32-bit PV Guest Privilege Escalation via Descriptor Table Limit Bypass

Title source: llm
STIX 2.1

Description

An issue was discovered in Xen through 4.12.x allowing 32-bit PV guest OS users to gain guest OS privileges by installing and using descriptors. There is missing descriptor table limit checking in x86 PV emulation. When emulating certain PV guest operations, descriptor table accesses are performed by the emulating code. Such accesses should respect the guest specified limits, unless otherwise guaranteed to fail in such a case. Without this, emulation of 32-bit guest user mode calls through call gates would allow guest user mode to install and then use descriptors of their choice, as long as the guest kernel did not itself install an LDT. (Most OSes don't install any LDT by default). 32-bit PV guest user mode can elevate its privileges to that of the guest kernel. Xen versions from at least 3.2 onwards are affected. Only 32-bit PV guest user mode can leverage this vulnerability. HVM, PVH, as well as 64-bit PV guests cannot leverage this vulnerability. Arm systems are unaffected.

References (9)

Core 9
Core References
Patch, Vendor Advisory x_refsource_misc
http://xenbits.xen.org/xsa/advisory-298.html
Mailing List, Third Party Advisory mailing-list x_refsource_mlist
http://www.openwall.com/lists/oss-security/2019/10/31/2
Mailing List, Third Party Advisory vendor-advisory x_refsource_suse
http://lists.opensuse.org/opensuse-security-announce/2019-11/msg00037.html
Third Party Advisory vendor-advisory x_refsource_debian
https://www.debian.org/security/2020/dsa-4602
Mailing List, Third Party Advisory mailing-list x_refsource_bugtraq
https://seclists.org/bugtraq/2020/Jan/21
Third Party Advisory vendor-advisory x_refsource_gentoo
https://security.gentoo.org/glsa/202003-56

Scores

CVSS v3 9.8
EPSS 0.0487
EPSS Percentile 89.7%
Attack Vector NETWORK
CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:H

Details

CWE
CWE-269
Status published
Products (7)
debian/debian_linux 9.0
debian/debian_linux 10.0
fedoraproject/fedora 29
fedoraproject/fedora 30
fedoraproject/fedora 31
opensuse/leap 15.0
xen/xen < 4.12.1
Published Oct 31, 2019
Tracked Since Feb 18, 2026