The biggest event of the last week was definitely Argentina National Team and Messi’s success in FIFA World Cup 2022. One of the biggest sports events of the year’s popularity was also reflected online and World Cup final-related searches broke several search records online. Also this week we saw something very unusual. Vulnerabilities that have a CVSS score of 10 are rare. But a Linux kernel with a 10 CVSS score is much more extraordinary. This week, Linux fixed such a vulnerability. Also this week, the new versions of EndeavourOS and Debian distros were released.
Linux fixes a CVSS 10 vulnerability
Linux Foundation has released an update to fix a kernel-level vulnerability that has a CVSS score of 10 affecting server message block servers. The researchers alerted the Linux Foundation about the vulnerability on 26 July 2022, and the coordinated public disclosure was released on 22 December 2022. Although it has a CVSS score of 10, experts stated that most businesses and enterprises aren’t affected because the majority of them are using the more popular Samba suite. The vulnerability was discovered by Arnaud Gatignol, Quentin Minster, Florent Saudel, and Guillaume Teissier from Thalium Team.
EndeavourOS “Cassini” 22.12 is available for download
EndeavourOS developers have announced the release of the latest update for the operating system this year. Version 22.12, codenamed Cassinis, is taking its name from the space-research mission of sending a probe to Saturn. EndeavourOS Cassini 22.12 is a maintenance version for Artemis, so there are no big changes other than package updates and bug fixes in this release. The Cassini release utilizes Linux kernel 6.0.12.arch1-1 and uses Xfce 4.18 as its desktop environment by default. However, EndeavourOS offers MATE, LXQt, LXDE, Cinnamon, KDE Plasma, GNOME, and Budgie desktop environment options as well.
Göran Marby resigns as President and CEO of ICANN
ICANN announced that the Board of Directors has accepted Göran Marby’s resignation as President and Chief Executive Officer. Marby’s departure is effective immediately. Marby will consult with ICANN until May 23, 2024, to support the transition, at the request of the Board and advise the Board on any issue they require. The Board will start searching for a new CEO at the start of 2023. Sally Costerton, ICANN Senior Advisor to the President and Senior Vice President, Global Stakeholder Engagement, has been named as Interim President and CEO.
Debian 11.6 “Bullseye” is available for download
Debian developers have announced the release of the sixth maintenance update for version 11 of the operating system. Debian 11.6 “Bullseye” is the sixth maintenance update for the 11 series. Debian 11.6 brings mostly package updates, bug fixes, and security fixes, so do not expect some new features. The newest version of the Debian distribution delivers 69 bug fixes alongside 78 security fixes. The newest version of the Debian “Bullseye” series is now available for most of the architectures and also available with desktop environments for amd64 and i386 systems.
ChatGPT can be used to create a full infection flow
Researchers demonstrated that ChatGPT can be used to create a full infection flow, from spear-phishing to running a reverse shell. The team managed to create a full infection flow without writing a single line of code and let the AIs do the work. The team tried to create a single execution flow, a phishing email with a malicious Excel file weaponized with macros that downloads a reverse shell. Check Point Research stated that AI capabilities can lower the bar for code generation, which can help less-skilled threat actors effortlessly launch cyber-attacks.
The World Cup final breaks multiple search records online
Google surpassed all prior search records on December 18, 2022, during the FIFA World Cup final, which Google CEO Sundar Pichai called “one of the greatest games ever”. Not just Google experienced heavy traffic during the World Cup final; Twitter saw the highest number of tweets per second (24,400 tweets) for World Cup after France’s goal, according to Twitter CEO Elon Musk’s tweet. As the events on the field took place, a number of brands also joined the discussion. Among the sponsors of the event that received the most international attention were Adidas, Budweiser, and Hyundai.
CloudLinux introduces new features for the CloudLinux OS Solo plan
CloudLinux has announced some new features for its Solo plan. CloudLinux OS Solo is one of the operating system’s plans that is developed with the growing small businesses in mind; allowing customers seamlessly upgrade their hosting plans from shared to VPS or dedicated when their traffic grows. CloudLinux OS Solo provides 1:1 feature parity for an upgrade to VPS hosting plan. In order to ensure a seamless upgrade process, CloudLinux OS Solo now introduces a few new features: HardenedPHP, PHP Selector, CageFS.