Meltdown and Spectre are the names of two serious security flaws that have been found within computer processors. They could allow hackers to steal sensitive data without users knowing.
To exploit these vulnerabilities, an attacker would have to run their executable code on the UCx Server. E-MetroTel is very restrictive when it comes to the installation/execution of 3rd party software on UCx systems for security and supportability reasons (i.e. the UCx software platform is effectively a closed controlled environment). This E-MetroTel policy is by itself the first level of defense.
A virtualization library installed on a Linux system would make such exploits easier. The library has no useful purpose on UCx and thus is not installed. Without the library, the scope of possible exploits is reduced.
An updated Linux kernel with a fix for these exploits has been released by RedHat on 2017 Dec 28. The changes were propagated to CentOS on 2018 Jan 4. For UCx systems that are configured to use public repositories, the kernel was available to them on 2018 Jan 4. E-MetroTel tested the CentOS kernel and released it into the E-MetroTel internal CentOS repository on 2018 Jan 5. For UCx systems that are configured to use only E-MetroTel repositories, the kernel was available to them on 2018 Jan 5.