OpenBSD Journal

OpenBSD Journal

Source and state limiters introduced in pf

Contributed by rueda on from the better-a-limited-state-than-a-failed-one dept.

David Gwynne (dlg@) has introduced source and state limiters, which provide a massive increase in the flexibily of pf traffic limiting:

CVSROOT:	/cvs
Module name:	src
Changes by:	dlg@cvs.openbsd.org	2025/11/10 21:06:20

Modified files:
	sbin/pfctl     : parse.y pfctl.8 pfctl.c pfctl_parser.c 
	                 pfctl_parser.h 
	share/man/man5 : pf.conf.5 
	sys/net        : pf.c pf_ioctl.c pf_table.c pfvar.h pfvar_priv.h 

Log message:
introduce source and state limiters in pf.

both source and state limiters can provide constraints on the number
of states that a set of rules can create, and optionally the rate
at which they are created. state limiters have a single limit, but
source limiters apply limits against a source address (or network).
the source address entries are dynamically created and destroyed,
and are also limited.

Read more…

Big news for small /usr partitions

Contributed by rueda on from the here's-a-nickel-kid dept.

Several recent commits have improved sysupgrade(8) handling of low free disk space in /usr:

Firstly, Stuart Henderson (sthen@) modified the installer to increase free space prior to installing:

CVSROOT:	/cvs
Module name:	src
Changes by:	sthen@cvs.openbsd.org	2025/11/01 06:54:17

Modified files:
	distrib/miniroot: install.sub 

Log message:
Before extracting on an upgrade, remove share/relink/*, not just
share/relink/usr/lib/*. The old files aren't useful post-upgrade and
this increases the chance of successfully extracting base*.tgz files,
so that people low on space in /usr have a better chance of getting
into the system after a reboot.

"install.sub can delete the entire relink space" deraadt@

Read more…

In -current, chromium (and derivatives) gain VA-API support

Contributed by rueda on from the take-2 dept.

Following the previous reverted attempt [see earlier report], Robert Nagy (robert@) committed VA-API [hardware-assisted video - see previous report] support to the chromium and ungoogled-chromium ports. The iridium port can be expected to follow on next update.

Note that:

  • Updated (binary) packages are not yet available at the time of writing.
  • Intel GPUs requires ports graphics/intel-media-driver [and/]or graphics/intel-vaapi-driver.

Enable BPF filtering on sockets

Contributed by Peter N. M. Hansteen on from the BPF my daemons, Puffy! dept.

Would it be useful for our system security to let daemons use the bpf(4) interface to filter on the sockets they handle?

In a recent message to tech@ titled bpf filtering on arbitrary sockets, Damien Miller (djm@) presents a preliminary patch and explains,

List:       openbsd-tech
Subject:    bpf filtering on arbitrary sockets
From:       Damien Miller <djm () mindrot ! org>
Date:       2025-10-30 5:03:00

Hi,

This is an idea that came up while talking with dlg@ about network
daemons.

Quite a few programs and daemons use SOCK_RAW to send link-level packets
after pledge(). E.g. usr.sbin/relayd/check_icmp.c wants to send ICMP
packets.

The problem with this is that, if they get compromised, they still hold
a very powerful socket that can send pretty much arbitrary packets. If
one of these programs gets compromised then the attacker can pretty
easily pivot through the existing raw socket.

Read more…

Making the veb(4) virtual Ethernet bridge VLAN aware

Contributed by Peter N. M. Hansteen on from the virtually bridging the LANs, really dept.

As some readers tell us whenever they have the chance, the veb(4) virtual Ethernet bridge device is an OpenBSD feature that can make certain setups a lot more manageable than otherwise possible.

Now David Gwynne (dlg@) is fielding a patch on tech@ that would make veb(4) even more capable, by making the device vlan(4) aware.

In the message to tech@, David explains:

List:       openbsd-tech
Subject:    make veb(4) VLAN aware
From:       David Gwynne <david () gwynne ! id ! au>
Date:       2025-10-29 5:54:42

veb(4) is currently vlan unaware, meaning that it assumes that there's a
single "namespace" for the mac addresses used by packets handled by the
bridge. by default it blocks vlan (and svlan) packets, but if you allow
it carry vlan packets it ignores the vlan tag when doing the mac address
lookups.

adding vlan awareness means that every mac address the bridge learns
is now associated with a vlan identifier (vid). ie, the same mac
in two different vlans will get separate entries in the forwarding
database.

Read more…

OpenBSD 7.8 Released

Contributed by rueda on from the noble-puffy-prize dept.

The OpenBSD project has announced OpenBSD 7.8, its 59th release.

The new release contains a number of significant improvements, including but certainly not limited to:

See the full changelog for more details of the changes made over this latest six month development cycle.

The Installation Guide details how to get the system up and running with a fresh install, while those who already run earlier releases should follow the Upgrade Guide, in most cases using sysupgrade(8).

Readers are encouraged to celebrate the new release by donating to the project to support further development of our favourite OS!

In -current, chromium (and derivatives) now have VA-API support

Contributed by rueda on from the smooth-and-cool dept.

Following a discussion on ports@, Robert Nagy (robert@) committed VA-API [hardware-assisted video - see previous report] support to the chromium, iridium, and ungoogled-chromium ports.

Note that:

  • Updated (binary) packages for amd64 are just starting to become available.
  • Intel GPUs requires ports graphics/intel-media-driver [and/]or graphics/intel-vaapi-driver.
  • Firefox already has VA-API support.

Update:
Now disabled again. Plus, we were wrong about Firefox. Thanks for the comments!

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Earlier Articles

OpenBSD Errata

OpenBSD 7.8

0052025-10-31 SECURITY smtpd(8) can die if a malformed imsg is sent on the local socket. CVE-2025-62875
0042025-10-28 RELIABILITY Ensure the group selected by a TLSv1.3 server for a HelloRetryRequest is not one for which the client has already sent a key share.
0032025-10-28 SECURITY DNS cache poisoning vulnerabilities in unbound could lead to domain hijacking. CVE-2025-11411
0022025-10-28 SECURITY Use-after-free and integer overflow in the Xkb and Present X server extensions. CVE-2025-62229 CVE-2025-62230 CVE-2025-62231
0012025-10-26 RELIABILITY syspatch(8) is confused by aliased /dev/*rootdisk nodes in the database generated by dev_mkdb(8). If syspatch fails (probably because /usr is not a separate filesystem), perform these steps:
sed -e 's/.checkfs/#checkfs/g' /usr/sbin/syspatch > /root/syspatch
ksh /root/syspatch
syspatch # re-run new syspatch command as instructed
rm /root/syspatch
dev_mkdb

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OpenBSD 7.7

0142025-10-31 SECURITY smtpd(8) can die if a malformed imsg is sent on the local socket. CVE-2025-62875
0132025-10-28 RELIABILITY Ensure the group selected by a TLSv1.3 server for a HelloRetryRequest is not one for which the client has already sent a key share.
0122025-10-28 SECURITY DNS cache poisoning vulnerabilities in unbound could lead to domain hijacking. CVE-2025-11411
0112025-10-28 SECURITY Use-after-free and integer overflow in the Xkb and Present X server extensions. CVE-2025-62229 CVE-2025-62230 CVE-2025-62231
0102025-09-30 SECURITY Fix out-of-bounds read and write, memory leaks and incorrect error check for CMS enveloped data.
0092025-09-30 SECURITY In libexpat fix denial of service due to memory exhaustion. CVE-2025-59375 CVE-2024-8176

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Copyright © - Daniel Hartmeier. All rights reserved. Articles and comments are copyright their respective authors, submission implies license to publish on this web site. Contents of the archive prior to as well as images and HTML templates were copied from the fabulous original deadly.org with Jose's and Jim's kind permission. This journal runs as CGI with httpd(8) on OpenBSD, the source code is BSD licensed. undeadly \Un*dead"ly\, a. Not subject to death; immortal. [Obs.]