Mozilla Firefox/Thunderbird/Firefox ESR on MacOS Hyperthreading Spectre race condition

Summaryinfo

A vulnerability marked as problematic has been reported in Mozilla Firefox, Thunderbird and Firefox ESR on MacOS. Affected by this issue is some unknown functionality of the component Hyperthreading. Performing a manipulation results in race condition (Spectre). This vulnerability was named CVE-2019-9815. The attack may be initiated remotely. There is no available exploit. It is suggested to upgrade the affected component.

Detailsinfo

A vulnerability, which was classified as problematic, was found in Mozilla Firefox, Thunderbird and Firefox ESR on MacOS (Web Browser) (the affected version is unknown). This affects an unknown code of the component Hyperthreading. The manipulation with an unknown input leads to a race condition vulnerability (Spectre). CWE is classifying the issue as CWE-362. The product contains a code sequence that can run concurrently with other code, and the code sequence requires temporary, exclusive access to a shared resource, but a timing window exists in which the shared resource can be modified by another code sequence that is operating concurrently. This is going to have an impact on confidentiality. The summary by CVE is:

If hyperthreading is not disabled, a timing attack vulnerability exists, similar to previous Spectre attacks. Apple has shipped macOS 10.14.5 with an option to disable hyperthreading in applications running untrusted code in a thread through a new sysctl. Firefox now makes use of it on the main thread and any worker threads. *Note: users need to update to macOS 10.14.5 in order to take advantage of this change.*. This vulnerability affects Thunderbird < 60.7, Firefox < 67, and Firefox ESR < 60.7.

The weakness was presented 07/23/2019. This vulnerability is uniquely identified as CVE-2019-9815 since 03/14/2019. It is possible to initiate the attack remotely. No form of authentication is needed for exploitation. It demands that the victim is doing some kind of user interaction. Neither technical details nor an exploit are publicly available.

The vulnerability scanner Nessus provides a plugin with the ID 246883 (Linux Distros Unpatched Vulnerability : CVE-2019-9815), which helps to determine the existence of the flaw in a target environment. The commercial vulnerability scanner Qualys is able to test this issue with plugin 371797 (Mozilla Firefox Multiple Security Vulnerabilities (MFSA 2019-13,MFSA2019-14)).

Upgrading eliminates this vulnerability.

The vulnerability is also documented in the vulnerability database at Tenable (246883). See VDB-138517, VDB-138516, VDB-138515 and VDB-138514 for similar entries. Several companies clearly confirm that VulDB is the primary source for best vulnerability data.

Productinfo

Type

• Web Browser

Vendor

• Mozilla

Name

• Firefox
• Firefox ESR
• Thunderbird

License

• open-source

Website

• Vendor: https://www.mozilla.org/
• Product: https://www.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/

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Entryinfo

Several companies clearly confirm that VulDB is the primary source for best vulnerability data.

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