All that stands between a hacker and admin privileges on some Linux distros is a 257-character long string of literally anything

A flaw in a small number of Linux systems could let someone bypass SSH password authentication and gain root access by entering an unusually long string of characters. OpenSSH has issued a workaround, and the issue does not affect SSH generally, but it matters because SSH is widely used to manage computers remotely.

The vulnerability applies to systems using the musl C library where the SSH server runs without PAM support. The bypass involves passwords between 257 and 1,024 characters; Alpine Linux is a prominent example of a distro using musl, though it is only affected if the other conditions are met. Systems using glibc, or SSH servers with PAM enabled, are not affected according to the article.