New AirPort Base Station and Time Capsule Firmware Available

Apple has released a software update AirPort Base Station and Time Capsule owners providing fixes for a number of user-reported issues. A security issue is also addressed.

Apple’s new AirPort Base Station and Time Capsule Firmware Update 7.6 is now available as a standalone download on the company’s site, but it will be served automatically via Software Update to owners owning AirPort Extreme 802.11n (1st Generation), AirPort Extreme Base Station, AirPort Express Base Station, or Time Capsule 802.11n (1st Generation).

This update is for all 802.11n AirPort Express, 802.11n AirPort Extreme and Time Capsule models Apple says, and it provides fixes for the following:

- An issue with performance on overlapping wireless networks
- An issue with AirPlay audio streaming
- An issue with configuring multiple entries for DNS servers

“It is recommended that AirPort Utility 5.5.3 or later be installed before updating to Firmware version 7.6,” Apple adds.

The release targets both Mac and Windows users.

AirPort Utility 5.5.3 (or newer updates) may be obtained through Apple's Support Download site at http://www.apple.com/support/downloads/ or via Software Update from the Apple Menu on your Mac.

Detailing the security content of Time Capsule and AirPort Base Station (802.11n) Firmware 7.6, Apple reveals that “An attacker in a privileged network position may be able to cause arbitrary command execution via malicious DHCP responses.”

According to the company’s advisory, “dhclient allowed remote attackers to execute arbitrary commands via shell metacharacters in a hostname obtained from a DHCP message. This issue is addressed by stripping shell meta-characters in dhclient-script.”

Apple credits Sebastian Krahmer and Marius Tomaschewski of the SUSE Security Team working with ISC for discovering and reporting the flaw.

To get a detailed overview of how to install the update, customers are advised to visit  “All about Time Capsule, AirPort Extreme, and AirPort Express base station firmware updates.”