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OpenBSD has a use-after-free allowing local privilege escalation to root

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101–110 of 170 posts

Re: OpenBSD has a use-after-free allowing local privilege escalation to root

#101

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Pretty sure you're familiar with their claims.

I'm not actually, because I'm damn sure I've never seen a piece of openbsd marketing in my life. All i know is that they're oriented around security and are notorious about rejecting patches.

Yes, you know that because of their marketing.

Re: OpenBSD has a use-after-free allowing local privilege escalation to root

#102
post #53

One bug found is a testament to the great diligence and culture around security of OpenBSD. Especially if you take into account the amount of resources they have been able to achieve this with.

While I agree, OpenBSD also doesn't fully implement features/functionality. If your operating system only does 20% of what another operating system can do, it's easier for you to have 80% less bugs. That's not a knock, it's a design philosophy of OpenBSD (which is to do the minimal needed, and no more, in the most simplistic way).

If they can provide only 20% of the functionality and only 1% of the bugs, that's a compelling trade-off for many use-cases! (and a bit closer to the reality IMHO)

Re: OpenBSD has a use-after-free allowing local privilege escalation to root

#103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not actually, because I'm damn sure I've never seen a piece of openbsd marketing in my life. All i know is that they're oriented around security and are notorious about rejecting patches.

Yes, you know that because of their marketing.

Do you have an example of this?

Re: OpenBSD has a use-after-free allowing local privilege escalation to root

#104
post #13
post #8

OpenBSD's security stance being the stuff of legend, I'm curious how many vulns have been found over the last couple months while the big model companies are flaunting their ability to find exploits. It'd be super cool to see it remain tiny.

According to https://openai.com/index/patch-the-planet/ Linux: 24 LPEs, plus many additional vulnerabilities. OpenBSD: 1 LPE. FreeBSD: 7 LPEs, plus many additional vulnerabilities. Not sure what that says, though. Perhaps the models are more likely to find Linux issues because of the training.

Linux LPEs have never been in short supply, even before the AI age.

Re: OpenBSD has a use-after-free allowing local privilege escalation to root

#105
post #95

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> they deliberately disable every service by default and don't install any software beyond core. Do you prefer that or everything (or most/many services) being enabled by default? It's a good practice and, for me, very practical - I don't need to find everything I'm not using and disable it.

Nobody is saying that their minimal default install is itself problematic. But trumpeting your default install's safety record doesn't actually say much when the default install doesn't actually do anything. As soon as you add a package or a port you're beyond "default install" territory and their vaunted security reputation's coverage.

I think we agree except one point: IMHO the security of their default install is worth trumpeting: disabling by default is not a technical wonder, but it's good security that others don't do.

Re: OpenBSD has a use-after-free allowing local privilege escalation to root

#106
post #96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What else is out there that fits openWRT's use case? BIND seems like it would be a bit "heavy"

For caching recursive dns, unbound? I got the feeling that dnsmasq does more than just recursive dns though?

I think that is the "challenge" with dnsmasq. In addition to caching DNS it also does, dhcp, authoritative DNS, BOOTP and TFTP.

Re: OpenBSD has a use-after-free allowing local privilege escalation to root

#107
post #31
post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is an external audit. Why would Linux activity make a difference here? Are you theorizing that the churn causes bugs?

When more code is written, more bugs are written. Or, if the act of debugging is removing the bugs from software, then the act of programming is to put the bugs in the software.

Not necessarily.

Depends on the quality of the code being written.

Quality*Quantity

Re: OpenBSD has a use-after-free allowing local privilege escalation to root

#108
post #78
post #53

One bug found is a testament to the great diligence and culture around security of OpenBSD. Especially if you take into account the amount of resources they have been able to achieve this with.

+1 It is also a testament to solid engineering and attention to good security practices in general. These still work, also against fancy new AI attackers. When sophisticated attacks become cheaper to run, maybe it will (finally) be cheaper to do more solid engineering instead of doing it quick and dirty and ending up in indefinite bug-squashing mode.

I suspect the easier option is to use AI to review your own code. The arms race between developers and attackers might even make some of the AI valuations come true.

Re: OpenBSD has a use-after-free allowing local privilege escalation to root

#109
post #53

One bug found is a testament to the great diligence and culture around security of OpenBSD. Especially if you take into account the amount of resources they have been able to achieve this with.

While I agree, OpenBSD also doesn't fully implement features/functionality. If your operating system only does 20% of what another operating system can do, it's easier for you to have 80% less bugs. That's not a knock, it's a design philosophy of OpenBSD (which is to do the minimal needed, and no more, in the most simplistic way).

My hobby horse is the lack of a “modern” filesystem on obsd.

Without journaling I really don’t agree with the oft repeated claims it makes a good “router”.

Any networking gear I’ve used is treated as an appliance and I don’t want an unfortunate power outage causing data loss.

Re: OpenBSD has a use-after-free allowing local privilege escalation to root

#110
post #53

One bug found is a testament to the great diligence and culture around security of OpenBSD. Especially if you take into account the amount of resources they have been able to achieve this with.

While I agree, OpenBSD also doesn't fully implement features/functionality. If your operating system only does 20% of what another operating system can do, it's easier for you to have 80% less bugs. That's not a knock, it's a design philosophy of OpenBSD (which is to do the minimal needed, and no more, in the most simplistic way).

You're right, but of course OpenBSD does far more than 20%.

One thing I actually really like about OpenBSD is that things either work or they don't. There's no "Well it kind of works if you have this specific hardware set up and these programs running..." It just works 100% of the time, in 100% of the ways you expect, or it doesn't.

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