SLUBStick is a new Linux kernel exploit technique. It can allow an attacker to elevate a limited heap vulnerability to an arbitrary memory read/write access. This can be leveraged for privilege escalation and container escapes, even with modern defences enabled.[1]

Discovery

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SLUBStick was discovered by Lukas Maar, Stefan Gast, Martin Unterguggenberger, Mathias Oberhuber, and Stefan Mangard, Graz University of Technology, and first presented at USENIX 2024 symposium.[2]

Vulnerable platforms

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The technique is demonstrated on Linux kernel versions 5.19 and 6.2 on the x86_64 and x86 platform, but is assumed to be possible in all Linux versions on those platforms. Also Linux kernels running on virtual machines on those platforms are considered vulnerable.[citation needed]

Further reading

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References

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  1. ^ Bill Toulas (3 August 2024). "Linux kernel impacted by new SLUBStick cross-cache attack". Bleepingcomputer.
  2. ^ Lukas Maar, Stefan Gast, Martin Unterguggenberger, Mathias Oberhuber, and Stefan Mangard (16 August 2024). "SLUBStick: Arbitrary Memory Writes through Practical Software Cross-Cache Attacks within the Linux Kernel". USENIX.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)