Another Internet Explorer (IE) from Microsoft patch that really needs to be installed on every Windows computer at work and at home. One of the flaws is being actively exploited. Even people who don't use IE most of the time are forced to fire it up to use Microsoft Update to patch Windows and Office.
Note for end of year planning. Courses at SANS 2006 in Orlando are filling faster than at any conference in the past 3 years, and SANS has limited the size of classes to enable more hands-on exercises. Try to register by the end of the year to ensure you get into the classes you want. http://www.sans.org/sans2006
@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).
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********************** WhatWorks Webcasts *****************************
SANS WhatWorks in Intrusion Prevention and Detection: Law Firm Lays Down the Law on VoIP Security Tuesday, December 20 at 1:00 PM EST (1800 UTC/GMT) http://www.sans.org/info.php?id=966
No other vendor assessment system asks the users which products actually work and for proof. Visit www.sans.org/whatworks to find the security tools that have made it through the WhatWorks process. And don't miss Tuesday's webcast
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Part I is compiled by Rohit Dhamankar 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: Microsoft released a cumulative security update for Internet Explorer that fixes the following vulnerabilities. (a) Internet Explorer contains a remote code execution flaw in handling the JavaScript "window()" function invoked via the "onload" event. Exploit code for this flaw has been posted since November 21, 2005. The vulnerability has also been exploited in the wild by Trojans Clunky-B and Delf.DH. (b) Internet Explorer contains a heap memory corruption issue in instantiating COM objects as ActiveX controls. Microsoft has been identifying and setting kill bits for many COM objects since the past few Internet Explorer updates. (c) Internet Explorer contains vulnerability while displaying "file download" dialogue box that can be exploited to execute arbitrary code on a client system. The problem arises because a malicious webpage can hide the "file download" dialogue box behind another browser window. When the user clicks on the other browser window, the clicks could be interpreted by the file download dialogue box to download and run the malware on the user's system. Note that a fair amount of user interaction would be required to exploit the flaw. (d) The update has also set the kill bit for Microsoft MciWndx and First4Internet XCP (Sony BMG) ActiveX controls.
Status: Apply the update referenced in the Microsoft Security Bulletin MS05-054 on an expedited basis as one of the flaws is being actively exploited. A general workaround to prevent complete compromise of systems running Internet Explorer is to run Internet Explorer with limited privileges. Microsoft "DropMyRights" tool can be used for such purposes.
Council Site Actions: All of the reporting council sites are responding to this issue. Some are treating this as a high priority update and pushing out as soon as the QA process is finished. Other sites plan to deploy during their next regularly scheduled maintenance window (after QA). One site has already completed their deployment of the update.
Description: Lyris ListManager software, which can run on Windows/Linux/Solaris platforms, is designed for managing e-mail lists, newsletters and discussion groups. The software is used by a wide range of companies from industrial, finance, IT and education sectors. The software contains following vulnerabilities: (a) The "/read/attachment" scripts contains a SQL injection flaw that can be used to execute arbitrary SQL commands against the back-end database. If the backend database is MS-SQL, it may be possible to invoke xp_cmdshell command and obtain a complete control over the system running the database. (b) By appending the SQL queries with an "ORDER BY" column, with MS-SQL as the backend database it is possible to invoke xp_cmdshell and obtain a complete control over the database host. (c) The "/subscribe/subscribe" script contains a SQL injection flaw that can be exploited to execute arbitrary list administration commands. (d) The ListManager configures a weak password for the "sa" account when MS-SQL is used as a backend database. Hence, it is possible to brute-force this password, and obtain a complete control over the database. Exploit code has been included in the Metasploit tool.
Status: Some flaws have been fixed in the new version 8.9b. The discoverer reports that the weak "sa" password flaw and the SQL injection in the "subscribe" fixed are not yet fixed. Note that although the flaws require "user" privileges for exploitation obtaining those is trivial in many cases.
Council Site Actions: The affected software and/or configuration are not in production or widespread use, or are not officially supported at any of the council sites. They reported that no action was necessary.
Council Site Actions: Only three of the responding council sites are using the affected software and all of these sites have already deployed the patches.
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 4734 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.
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