Debian LinuxOperating system · Debian
CVE-2011-2910
Official description Straight from the sourceThe vendor's or NVD's own wording, published unedited. Authoritative, but often terse — it says what broke, rarely what to do.
NVD · uneditedThe AX.25 daemon (ax25d) in ax25-tools before 0.0.8-13 does not check the return value of a setuid call. The setuid call is responsible for dropping privileges but if the call fails the daemon would continue to run with root privileges which can allow possible privilege escalation.
Technical summary Written by usOur analysis, written from the advisory, the CVSS vector and the affected-version data. It adds context the advisory leaves out, and never invents facts that are not in the source.
dbcve analysis · high confidenceThe AX.25 daemon (ax25d) in ax25-tools before 0.0.8-13 fails to check the return value of the setuid() call used to drop root privileges after startup. If setuid() fails, the daemon continues running with root privileges, violating the principle of least privilege and creating a potential privilege escalation vector.
Verify against the referenced sources before acting — the references below are authoritative for this CVE, this summary is not.
Affected products & versions What the vendor confirmedThe version ranges the vendor confirmed as vulnerable. If your version sits inside a range here, treat yourself as exposed until you have upgraded.
NVD · CPE data
Debian LinuxOperating system
= 8.0= 9.0= 10.0< 0.0.8-13CVSS breakdown How the score is builtThe industry scoring standard. It rates how the flaw is reached, what it takes to exploit, and what an attacker gains — the score is derived from those, not the other way round.
From the vector- Attack vector
- Local
- Complexity
- Low
- Privileges
- High
- User interaction
- None
- Scope
- Unchanged
- Confidentiality
- High
- Integrity
- High
- Availability
- High
CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:L/PR:H/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:H
Am I affected? How to checkSteps we derive from the advisory and the affected-version data, so you can decide whether this CVE reaches your setup. They are a guide, not a scan — your own configuration is the authority.
dbcve checksWork through these to decide whether this CVE applies to you.
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Verify ax25-tools package is installedQuery the package manager: dpkg -l | grep ax25-tools (Debian) or rpm -qa | grep ax25-tools (RPM-based)Affected if No ax25-tools package is found - the product is not installed and not affected
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Check installed ax25-tools versionRun: dpkg -l ax25-tools or rpm -q ax25-tools to obtain the exact version numberAffected if Version is present and less than 0.0.8-13 (e.g., 0.0.8-12, 0.0.8-10, etc.) - the version falls within the affected range
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Verify ax25d daemon is runningRun: ps aux | grep ax25d or pgrep -a ax25d to check for running processesAffected if ax25d process is not running - the vulnerable code is not active in memory
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Check if ax25d is running as rootRun: ps -o user,pid,cmd -p $(pgrep ax25d) to see the effective user of the running daemonAffected if ax25d is running with effective user ID 0 (root) - this indicates setuid() failed but the daemon continued running, which is the vulnerability manifestation
User is affected if ax25-tools version is below 0.0.8-13 AND ax25d is currently running as root, indicating the privilege drop failure was not handled securely.
Generated from the published advisory. Verify against your own configuration.
Remediation Closing itWhat it takes to close this. Where a vendor fix exists we point at it; where none exists we say so plainly, and can build one. Effort estimates are scoped from the advisory, not from your codebase.
From vendor data0.0.8-13
Upgrade ax25-tools to version 0.0.8-13 or later which implements proper error checking on the setuid call and terminates if privilege dropping fails.
Fix this in Debian Linux
Scoped from the published advisory
- Consultation2.0 h
- Implementation2.0 h
- Testing3.0 h
- Review / QA2.0 h
An estimate, not a bill — we confirm scope with you before any work starts. Need it this week? Rush from $2,512.
Scan for this in your stack
Free · runs locallyCheck whether your project pulls in CVE-2011-2910 — or any other known-vulnerable package — straight from your lock files. Free and open source; it runs locally and uploads nothing.
References Go to the primary sourcePrimary sources — vendor advisories, patches and trackers. Where our summary and a reference disagree, the reference wins.
Primary sourcesPractitioner notes
ContributedPeer-ranked notes from engineers who’ve handled CVE-2011-2910 in production — separate from our analysis above.
The advisory tells you what broke. It rarely tells you what actually worked. If you’ve dealt with this one, that detail is what the next engineer is searching for.
- The version that genuinely resolved it — not the one the vendor claimed
- A config change or rule that shut the vector down
- A gotcha in the upgrade path that cost you an afternoon
No notes yet
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- Version or environment caveats, and links to real fixes
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