BSD Weekly, Issue 301

OpenBSD 8.0 release, FreeBSD security advisories, NetBSD AI-free stance and more

Releases

OpenBSD 8.0: OpenBSD 8.0 introduces multi-processor support for up to 64 guest VCPUs in vmd, DRM graphics updated to Linux 6.18.53 with Intel Arc support, and boot-time random relinking for httpd and smtpd. The release also expands amd64 kernel virtual address space to 512G, adds hibernate support on arm64, switches sparc64 to the LLVM toolchain, and includes updates across the installer, pf firewall, and hardware drivers.

BSDSec

OpenBSD Errata: October 20, 2026 (ppp isakmpd nsd aesgmac video): Errata patches for ppp interface, isakmpd, NSD, X11 server, IPsec crypto, and video driver have been released for OpenBSD 7.8, 7.9, and 8.0, with binary updates available via syspatch on amd64, arm64, and i386.

FreeBSD Security Advisory FreeBSD-SA-26:71.sound: A TOCTOU race between sound(4) buffer resizing and mmap can let an unprivileged local user trigger a kernel use-after-free and potentially escalate privileges on all supported FreeBSD versions; patches and updated binaries are available.

FreeBSD Security Advisory FreeBSD-SA-26:72.bhyve: FreeBSD has issued a security advisory for multiple vulnerabilities in bhyve’s device models (xHCI, HDA audio, framebuffer) that could allow a malicious guest to crash the bhyve process or execute arbitrary code in the host userspace context, with patches available for FreeBSD 14.4, 14.5, 15.0, and 15.1.

FreeBSD Security Advisory FreeBSD-SA-26:70.tcp: FreeBSD 15.1 has a remotely triggerable buffer overflow in the tcp_rack kernel module where a 16-bit allocation counter wraps to zero, allowing an out-of-bounds write of ~512 KB in the kernel heap and possibly causing a panic; systems not using tcp_rack.ko are unaffected and updates are available via pkg, freebsd-update, or source patch.

FreeBSD Errata Notice FreeBSD-EN-26:27.tcp: A TCP timer overflow bug in FreeBSD 15.1 and 14.4 can cause timers to fire late or not at all, leaving connections stuck and consuming resources, with patches and workarounds provided.

FreeBSD Errata Notice FreeBSD-EN-26:26.hastd: FreeBSD has issued an errata for hastd(8) addressing three issues: empty control messages causing hastctl to abort, uninitialized padding in nvpair exposing config data in metadata, and a hang during primary-to-secondary transition that leaves HAST in degraded mode.

FreeBSD Errata Notice FreeBSD-EN-26:25.tzdata: FreeBSD has issued an errata notice to update the IANA Time Zone Database in /usr/share/zoneinfo for all supported releases, as recent changes to future and past timestamps affect many regions and require running tzsetup(8) to update /etc/localtime.

As always, it’s worth following BSDSec. RSS feed available.

News

Valuable News – 2026/10/19: This week’s roundup covers running macOS on AMD hardware via FreeBSD bhyve, NetBSD running on 32-bit RISC-V, practical RAIDZ expansion, OpenBSD’s new uncm(4) driver, Syncthing on NetBSD, and more.

New OpenBSD Port Proposed for Wine: Thomas Frohwein has submitted a port proposal for Wine on OpenBSD, enabling 64-bit Windows applications to run via software emulation of the %gs prefix. The initial draft supports 64-bit software only, as 32-bit support via WoW64 is not yet working.

Introducing uncm(4): Jan Schreiber’s new uncm(4) driver adds USB CDC NCM support for Android tethering on OpenBSD, requires no firmware blob, and has been included in the amd64 installer kernel for the upcoming 8.0 release.

BSD Now 685: Busy at the bar: This week covers the impact of BSD code, an overview of Aoostar WRT Pro on BSD, Suricata with netmap, clarifying man pages, Podman on FreeBSD, OpenBSD -current becoming 8.0-current, and Sylve Ansible modules.

NetBSD may have found a new role: The AI-free FOSS OS: NetBSD reports record donations after its explicit ban on AI-generated code, contrasting with Linux and other FOSS projects embracing AI, and highlights its minimal, portable design and welcoming community.

Tutorials

Single-Partition Encrypted NetBSD 11 Root: This guide details how to install NetBSD 11 with full root encryption using CGD and ramdisk-cgdroot within a single MBR partition. It covers disklabel partitioning, CGD setup, extracting base sets, chroot configuration, and optional firmware injection into the boot ramdisk.

Exploring the HumanWare BrailleNote Apex with FreeBSD: A collection of personal notes on connecting and using a HumanWare BrailleNote Apex with a laptop running FreeBSD 16.0-CURRENT (main).

RAIDZ Expansion in Practice: What It Solves and What It Doesn’t: Explains how OpenZFS 2.3’s RAIDZ expansion lets you add one disk at a time to an existing vdev without downtime, what it gains in capacity, and why it does not change RAIDZ level, improve IOPS, or retroactively upgrade parity for existing data.

M715q power usage and the BSDes: A hands-on comparison of idle and load power draw on a ThinkCentre M715q running Debian 13, FreeBSD 15.1, NetBSD 11.0, and OpenBSD 7.9, with notes on GPU support, temperature, and workstation suitability.

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Thanks for reading and see you next week! Stay safe!