IBM i PTF Guide, Volume 25, Number 49

December 6, 2023 Doug Bidwell

Welcome back to having to worry about security vulnerabilities and PTF patches. This week, there are two security vulnerabilities, a set of patches for IBM i 7.2, and HIPERS for IBM i 7.4 and IBM i 7.5 – among other things. Let’s do the vulnerabilities to start.

First, we have Security Bulletin: IBM Java SDK and IBM Java Runtime for IBM i are vulnerable to a remote attacker causing integrity impacts due to the libraries component (CVE-2023-22049), which you can find out more about here. The IBM i PTF Group numbers contain the fix for the vulnerability. Future PTF Groups for Java will also contain the fix for the vulnerability:

IBM i Release	5770-JV1 PTF Group Number and Level
7.5	SF99955 Level 7
7.4	SF99665 Level 20
7.3	SF99725 Level 30

Second, we have Security Bulletin: IBM Administration Runtime Expert for i is vulnerable to an attacker obtaining sensitive information due to CVE-2023-42006, which you can see more about at this link. Here are the patches:

IBM i Release	5733-ARE PTF Number 	
7.5	SI84843		
7.4	SI84843		
7.3	SI84843		
7.2	SI84843

Finally, there is SF99719 720 Group HIPER – level 238, which you can read about here.

Here is the rundown of PTF Groups by IBM i release level since we last published:

PTF Groups 7.5:

HIPERS
TCP/IP
QMGTOOLS

PTF Groups 7.4:

HIPERS
DB2 for IBM i
TCP/IP
QMGTOOLS

PTF Groups 7.3:

TCP/IP

Tip O’ The Week, AGAIN: An immutable backup is a backup file that can’t be altered in any way. An immutable backup should be unchangeable and able to deploy to production servers immediately in case of ransomware attacks or other data loss. The key difference between mutable and immutable backup is that data saved by an immutable backup solution can’t be tampered with or modified. On the other hand, mutable backups can be easily encrypted, changed, or deleted – common tactics used by cybercriminals trying to force a ransom payment. What would be an immutable backup of an IBM i system/partition?

New (or Updated) links added to the ‘Links’ tab in the guide this week:

TCP/IP: Changing the TCP/IP Address on IBM OS/400, 641327

New (or Updated) links added to the ‘QMGtools’ tab in the guide this week:

None

New (or Updated) links added to the ‘ACS_NAV’ tab in the guide this week:

None

New (or Updated) links added to the ‘Prtr Links’ tab in the guide this week:

None

New (or Updated) links Redbooks added this week:

None

The Guide at a glance: There are new defectives this week (12/02/23). Here is the defective PTF rundown, which is the last defective for each release:

	Defect		Defective	APAR	Fixing
	Date		PTF			PTF
	--------	--------	-------	------------------------	
7.5	10/06/23	SI84569		SE80598	SI84813 (When available)
7.4	10/06/23	SI84583		SE80598	SI84817 (When available)
7.3	10/06/23	SI84586		SE80598	SI84842 (When available)

Be sure to access the link in the Guide for further details.

Below is the usual archive of the IBM i PTF Guide to help you work through the PTFs in chronological order:

December 2, 2023: Volume 25, Number 49

November 25, 2023: Volume 25, Number 48

November 18, 2023: Volume 25, Number 47

November 11, 2023: Volume 25, Number 46

November 4, 2023: Volume 25, Number 45

October 28, 2023: Volume 25, Number 44

October 21, 2023: Volume 25, Number 43

October 14, 2023: Volume 25, Number 42

October 7, 2023: Volume 25, Number 41

September 30, 2023: Volume 25, Number 40