Apple Macintosh computers may be safer than Windows PCs, but this week's three critical Mac vulnerabilities reminds us that the vendors have a long way to go before they deliver a fully secure operating system.
Alan
@RISK is the SANS community's consensus bulletin summarizing the most important vulnerabilities and exploits identified during the past week and providing guidance on appropriate actions to protect your systems (PART I). It also includes a comprehensive list of all new vulnerabilities discovered in the past week (PART II).
************************ Sponsored by Symark **************************
Secure storage and access control for all your ADMINISTRATIVE PASSWORDS: UNIX/Linux, Windows, databases, routers and firewalls http://www.symark.com/powerkeeper.htm
*************************************************************************
Why Professionals Always Attend SANS Training If They Have A Choice
(1) "SANS courses balance the why and the how-to of security. Not only will you learn something, you learn how to do something." (Greg Kotula, Wall Street On Demand)
(2)" SANS never fails to provide top level training that is worth every penny." (Tyler Hudak, Yellow Roadway Tech)
(3) "SANS training gives me the tools I need to do my job." (Michael Hiramoto, NCI)
*************************************************************************
*************************** SPONSORED LINKS *****************************
This link points to a site outside SANS:
1) Learn more about Radware at SANS Rocky Mountain 2005, Denver, CO, May 10, 2005 Download DefensePro whitepaper http://www.sans.org/info.php?id=770
*************************************************************************
SANS@Home Program
The SANS@HOME program is designed for professionals who are seeking a flexible alternative to SANS popular six-day conferences. The Program enables students to participate in SANS training, without the expense, disruptions and inconvenience of travel or taking time out of the workday.
The goal of the SANS@HOME Program is to offer an alternative method of outstanding security training and help every student obtain GIAC certification.
See http://www.sans.org/athome/ for upcoming sessions. New sessions are being added frequently.
*************************************************************************
Part I is compiled by Rohit Dhamankar (rohitd_at_tippingpoint.com) at TippingPoint, a division of 3Com, as a by-product of that company's continuous effort to ensure that its intrusion prevention products effectively block exploits using known vulnerabilities. TippingPoint's analysis is complemented by input from a council of security managers from twelve large organizations who confidentially share with SANS the specific actions they have taken to protect their systems. A detailed description of the process may be found at http://www.sans.org/newsletters/cva/#process
Description: Apple released a cumulative security update on May 3, 2005. This update fixes a number of remote and local vulnerabilities that may be exploited to completely compromise a system running Mac OS. The critical vulnerabilities that can be remotely exploited, and have been fixed are: (a) The "x-man-page://" URL is designed for man page look-ups, and is handled by the terminal program. Mac OS does not properly sanitize the URL; Hence, it is possible to inject certain characters in the URL and execute arbitrary commands on a user's system. A proof-of-concept exploit has been publicly posted. (b) Mac OS contains a heap-based overflow in handling TIFF images that can be exploited to execute arbitrary code. The technical details for this flaw have been posted since December 2004. (c) The "help://" URL associated with the Help Viewer application can be used to execute arbitrary JavaScript code. A proof-of-concept exploit has been publicly posted.
Status: Apply the patch referenced in the Apple Security Update 2005-005.
Description: Ethereal is a popular open source network sniffer and protocol analyzer for Unix and Windows platforms. The software contains format string or buffer overflow vulnerabilities in parsing the following protocols: DISTCC, FCELS, SIP, ISIS, ANSI A, Megaco, Q.931, CMIP, CMP, CMS, CRMF, ESS, OCSP, PKIX1Explitit, PKIX Qualified, X.509, ISUP and TCAP. Many of these flaws can be exploited to execute arbitrary code with the privileges of the ethereal process (typically"root" when ethereal is being used as a sniffer). To exploit these flaws, an attacker has to either inject the malicious packets into the network traffic being sniffed by ethereal, or entice a client to open a specially crafted packet capture file. The technical details can be obtained by examining the fixed code. Note that any network applications based on ethereal protocol decoder modules may also be affected.
Status: Vendor confirmed, upgrade to version 0.10.11. Many of the protocol decoders affected are for UDP-based protocols. This makes it easy for an attacker to inject malformed packets in any network.
Description: HP's Openview Radia Management portal (RMP) can be used to remotely and centrally manage software updates, patches, and configuration on a number of UNIX and/or Windows systems. The Radia Management Portal running Radia Management Agent (RMA) contains a vulnerability that can be exploited by an unauthenticated attacker to execute arbitrary commands. The commands can be executed with "SYSTEM" privileges if Radia software is running on Windows. The discoverers have not released any technical details now but claim that they plan to do so after 3 months. Note that this vulnerability may lead to an enterprise-wide compromise, and hence should be patched on a priority basis.
Status: HP has acknowledged the flaw, and released patches. Block the ports 3465/tcp and 3466/tcp, which are associated with Radia management and agent communications, at the network perimeter to minimize the possibility of attacks originating from the Internet.
Council Site Actions: The affected software is not in production or widespread use, or is not officially supported at any of the council sites. They reported that no action was necessary.
Description: Claroline is a PHP/MySQL based software package designed for educational institutions to create online courses. The software is being used around the world by a number of institutions. The software contains 10 SQL injection and 4 remote command execution vulnerabilities. The flaws can be exploited to execute arbitrary PHP scripts on the Claroline server and/or manipulate the SQL queries issued against the back-end MySQL database. The technical details about the SQL injection flaws have been posted publicly. The details about the remote command injection vulnerabilities can be obtained by examining the fixed version of the software.
Status: Vendor confirmed. Upgrade to version 1.54 or 1.6 final.
Council Site Actions: The affected software is not in production or widespread use, or is not officially supported at any of the council sites. They reported that no action was necessary.
Description: osTicket is an open-source PHP-based customer support system. This software contains multiple SQL injection and remote file include vulnerabilities. The flaws can be exploited to execute arbitrary PHP scripts on the osTicket server and/or manipulate the SQL queries issued against the back-end database. The posting shows how to craft HTTP requests to leverage these flaws.
Status: Vendor confirmed, upgrade to the version 1.2.7.
Council Site Actions: The affected software is not in production or widespread use, or is not officially supported at any of the council sites. They reported that no action was necessary.
Description: Globalscape Secure FTP server is designed for data exchange between businesses and customers. This server contains a buffer overflow that can be triggered by sending an overlong FTP command (over 3000 bytes). An attacker can exploit the overflow to execute arbitrary code. Exploit code has been publicly posted. Note that FTP servers configured for "anonymous" access face the maximum risk.
Status: Vendor confirmed, upgrade to 3.0.3 Build 4.29.2005.
Council Site Actions: The affected software is not in production or widespread use, or is not officially supported at any of the council sites. They reported that no action was necessary.
Description: Netscape browser has been found vulnerable to some of the remote code execution flaws reported in the Firefox browser last week. Proof-of-concepts exploits are available for these vulnerabilities. Since there are no patches available, Netscape users should migrate to Mozilla/Firefox browsers.
Council Site Updates: Most of the council sites are no longer using Netscape as a supported browser and thus are not taking any action. One site is still actively trying to convince their support organization to abandon Netscape as a supported browser and move to Firefox. A second organization has a large number of Netscape users; however, they do not plan any action at this time. They have been pushing Internet Explorer as the preferred browser since late 2004.
This list is compiled by Qualys ( www.qualys.com ) as part of that company's ongoing effort to ensure its vulnerability management web service tests for all known vulnerabilities that can be scanned. As of this week Qualys scans for 4273 unique vulnerabilities. For this special SANS community listing, Qualys also includes vulnerabilities that cannot be scanned remotely.
(c) 2005. All rights reserved. The information contained in this newsletter, including any external links, is provided "AS IS," with no express or implied warranty, for informational purposes only. In some cases, copyright for material in this newsletter may be held by a party other than Qualys (as indicated herein) and permission to use such material must be requested from the copyright owner.
==end== Subscriptions: @RISK is distributed free of charge to people responsible for managing and securing information systems and networks. You may forward this newsletter to others with such responsibility inside or outside your organization.
To subscribe, at no cost, go to https://portal.sans.org where you may also request subscriptions to any of SANS other free newsletters.
To change your subscription, address, or other information, visit http://portal.sans.org Copyright 2005. All rights reserved. No posting or reuse allowed, other that listed above, without prior written permission.