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Submission + - WordPress, PHP Apps, Subject to Ghost glibc Attacks (threatpost.com)

Submitted by msm1267
msm1267 writes: Less than 48 hours after the disclosure of the Ghost vulnerability in the GNU C library (glibc), researchers have uncovered that PHP applications, including the WordPress content management system, could be another weak spot and eventually in the crosshairs of attackers.

Ghost is a vulnerability in glibc that attackers can use against only a handful of applications right now to remotely run executable code and gain control of a Linux server. The vulnerability is a heap-based buffer overflow and affects all Linux systems, according to experts, and has been present in the glibc code since 2000.

“An example of where this could be a big issue is within WordPress itself: it uses a function named wp_http_validate_url() to validate every pingback’s post URL,” wrote Sucuri research Marc-Alexandre Montpas in an advisory published Wednesday. “And it does so by using gethostbyname(). So an attacker could leverage this vector to insert a malicious URL that would trigger a buffer overflow bug, server-side, potentially allowing him to gain privileges on the server.”

Submission + - Ghost Vulnerability in glibc Affects All Linux Systems (threatpost.com)

Submitted by msm1267
msm1267 writes: A critical vulnerability has been found in glibc, the GNU C library, that affects all Linux systems dating back to 2000. Attackers can use this flaw to execute code and remotely gain control of Linux machines.

The issue stems from a heap-based buffer overflow found in the __nss_hostname_digits_dots() function in glibc. That particular function is used by the _gethostbyname function calls.

“A remote attacker able to make an application call either of these functions could use this flaw to execute arbitrary code with the permissions of the user running the application,” said an advisory from Linux distributor Red Hat.

The vulnerability, CVE-2015-0235, has already been nicknamed GHOST because of its relation to the _gethostbyname function. Researchers at Qualys discovered the flaw, and say it goes back to glibc version 2.2 in Linux systems published in November 2000.

According to Qualys, there is a mitigation for this issue that was published May 21, 2013 between patch glibc-2.17 versions and glibc-2.18. The patch, however, was not labeled a security fix at the time.

Submission + - Proposed CFAA Amendments Could 'Chill" Security Research (threatpost.com)

Submitted by msm1267
msm1267 writes: Legitimate security researchers, from bug hunters to pen-testers, are buckled in for a bumpy ride as vague language in President Obama’s proposed amendments to the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act (CFAA) is expected to be debated and sorted out as it makes its way through the legislature.

The amendments come with stiffer penalties for those convicted of hacking, with some sentences doubled and some offenses elevated to felonies.

One amendment to the CFAA contains language that is a redefinition of what it means to exceed authorized access; it broadens the scope of the CFAA considerably.

From section six in the amendment: ” ‘exceeds authorized access’ means to access a computer with authorization and to use such access to obtain or alter information in the computer (a) that the accesser is not entitled to obtain or alter; or (b) for a purpose that the accesser knows is not authorized by the computer owner.”

Submission + - Encryption is Not the Enemy

Submitted by Trailrunner7
Trailrunner7 writes: There are few things scarier these days than a politician stepping in front of a microphone, taking a deep breath and opening his mouth to pontificate on security. A long list of American elected officials have reinforced this, and on Monday, UK Prime Minister David Cameron jumped to the head of this undistinguished line with his dangerous statement that encrypted communications shouldn’t be allowed.

Cameron, speaking in the wake of the terror attack in Paris last week, said at an event Monday that the UK government can’t allow any form of communication that can’t be read.

“Are we going to allow a means of communications which it simply isn’t possible to read?” Cameron said, according to the New York Times. “My answer to that question is: ‘No, we must not.’ “

Aside from the specter of attackers identifying and exploiting an intentional backdoor, there is the problem of trying to bend software makers to the will of the government. Even if by some miracle the backdoor proposal succeeds, the government still would face the hurdle of getting software makers such as Apple to prevent secure communications apps from showing up in their app store. Apple does what Apple wants and generally not much else. And, as Doctorow says, how would Cameron address the global open source community, which produces much of the secure communications software?

These kinds of systems just flat don’t work.

“It won’t work. The basic problem with these proposals is they work against regular people who don’t care. But to make it work, you have to close the loopholes,” cryptographer Bruce Schneier, CTO of Co3 Systems, said in an interview. “If you can’t do that, you don’t hurt the bad guys, you only hurt the good guys. It plays well on TV to someone who doesn’t understand the tech. Everything works against my grandmother, but nothing works against professionals.”

Submission + - Mainstream Support of Windows 7 Ends (pcworld.com) 1

Submitted by jones_supa
jones_supa writes: The mainstream support of Microsoft Windows 7 ends today. The operating system leaving mainstream support means no more platform updates, no new features, and end of free support. Windows 7 will now enter extended support, which means that security updates will keep coming, and support will be offered for charge. The final end of support for Windows 7 will be reached January 14, 2020.

Submission + - Phony USB Charger Masquerades as Wireless Keylogger (threatpost.com) 3

Submitted by msm1267
msm1267 writes: Hardware hacker and security researcher Samy Kamkar has released a slick new device that masquerades as a typical USB wall charger but in fact houses a keylogger capable of recording keystrokes from nearby wireless keyboards.

The device is known as KeySweeper and Kamkar has released the source code and instructions for building one of your own. The components are inexpensive and easily available, and include an Arduino microcontroller, the charger itself and a handful of other bits. When it’s plugged into a wall socket, the KeySweeper will connect to a nearby Microsoft wireless keyboard and passively sniff, decrypt and record all of the keystrokes and send them back to the operator over the Web.

Submission + - Inside North Korea's Naenara Browser (threatpost.com)

Submitted by msm1267
msm1267 writes: Up until a few weeks ago, the number of people outside of North Korea who gave much thought to the Internet infrastructure in that country was vanishingly small. But the speculation about the Sony hack has fixed that, and now a security researcher has taken a hard look at the national browser used in North Korea and found more than a little weirdness.

The Naenara browser is part of the Red Star operating system used in North Korea and it’s a derivative of an outdated version of Mozilla Firefox. The country is known to tightly control the communications and activities of its citizens and that extends online, as well. Robert Hansen, vice president of WhiteHat Labs at WhiteHat Security, and an accomplished security researcher, recently got a copy of Naenara and began looking at its behavior, and he immediately realized that every time the browser loads, its first move is to make a request to a non-routable IP address, http://10.76.1.11./ That address is not reachable from networks outside the DPRK.

“Here’s where things start to go off the rails: what this means is that all of the DPRK’s national network is non-routable IP space. You heard me; they’re treating their entire country like some small to medium business might treat their corporate office,” Hansen wrote in a blog post detailing his findings. “The entire country of North Korea is sitting on one class A network (16,777,216 addresses). I was always under the impression they were just pretending that they owned large blocks of public IP space from a networking perspective, blocking everything and selectively turning on outbound traffic via access control lists. Apparently not!”

Submission + - First OSX Bootkit Revealed

Submitted by Trailrunner7
Trailrunner7 writes: A vulnerability at the heart of Apple’s Mac OS X systems—one thus far only partially addressed by Apple—opens the door to the installation of malicious firmware bootkits that resist cleanup and give hackers persistent, stealthy control over a compromised Mac.

The research is the work of a reverse engineering hobbyist and security researcher named Trammel Hudson, who gave a talk at the recent 31C3 event in Hamburg, Germany, during which he described an attack he called Thunderstrike. Thunderstrike is a Mac OS X bootkit delivered either through direct access to the Apple hardware (at the manufacturer or in transport), or via a Thunderbolt-connected peripheral device; the latter attack vector exposes vulnerable systems to Evil Maid attacks, or state-sponsored attacks where laptops are confiscated and examined in airports or border crossings, for example.

Hudson’s bootkit takes advantage of a vulnerability in how Apple computers deal with peripheral devices connected over Thunderbolt ports during a firmware update. In these cases, the flash is left unlocked, allowing an Option ROM, or peripheral firmware, to run during recovery mode boots. It then has to slip past Apple’s RSA signature check. Apple stores its public key in the boot ROM and signs firmware updates with its private key. The Option ROM over Thunderbolt circumvents this process and writes its own RSA key so that future updates can only be signed by the attacker’s key. The attack also disables the loading of further Option ROMs, closing that window of opportunity. A weaponized version of this attack would have free ring0 reign over the system.

Apple has only partially addressed the vulnerability behind this.

Submission + - Inside Cryptowall 2.0 Ransomware (threatpost.com)

Submitted by msm1267
msm1267 writes: If you need more evidence that ransomware is here to stay, and could turn into cybercriminals’ weapon of choice, look no further than Cryptowall.

Researchers at Cisco’s Talos group today published an analysis of a Cryptowall 2.0 sample, peeling back many layers of known commodities around this threat, such as its use of the Tor anonymity network to disguise command-and-control communication.

But perhaps more telling about the commitment around ransomware is the investment attackers made in its capabilities to detect execution in virtual environments, building in many stages of decryption present before the ransomware activates, and its ability to detect 32- and 64-bit architectures and executing different versions for each.

Submission + - Misfortune Cookie Home Router Vulnerability Discovered (threatpost.com)

Submitted by msm1267
msm1267 writes: More than 12 million devices running an embedded webserver called RomPager are vulnerable to a simple attack that could give a hacker man-in-the-middle position on traffic going to and from home routers from just about every leading manufacturer.

Mostly ISP-owned residential gateways manufactured by D-Link, Huawei, TP-Link, ZTE, Zyxel and several others are currently exposed. Researchers at Check Point Software Technologies reported the flaw they’ve called Misfortune Cookie, to all of the affected vendors and manufacturers, and most have responded that they will push new firmware and patches in short order.

The problem with embedded device security is that, with consumer-owned gear especially, it’s up to the device owner to find and flash new firmware, leaving most of the devices in question vulnerable indefinitely.

In the case of the RomPager vulnerability, an attacker need only send a single packet containing a malicious HTTP cookie to exploit the flaw. Such an exploit would corrupt memory on the device and allow an attacker to remotely gain administrative access to the device.

Submission + - Manufacturer Backdoor Found on Popular Chinese Android Smartphones (threatpost.com)

Submitted by msm1267
msm1267 writes: A popular Android smartphone sold primarily in China and Taiwan but also available worldwide, contains a backdoor from the manufacturer that is being used to push pop-up advertisements and install apps without users’ consent.

The Coolpad devices, however, are ripe for much more malicious abuse, researchers at Palo Alto Networks said today, especially after the discovery of a vulnerability in the backend management interface that exposed the backdoor’s control system.

The CoolReaper backdoor not only connects to a number of command and control servers, but is also capable of downloading, installing and activating any Android application without the user’s permission. It also sends phony over-the-air updates to devices that instead install applications without notifying the user. The backdoor can also be used to dial phone numbers, send SMS and MMS messages, and upload device and usage information to Coolpad.

The manufacturer has also taken steps via modifications to its version of Android to keep the backdoor hidden from users and security software that could be installed on the phone. For example, Olson said Coolpad has disabled the long-press system that allows a user to find out what application generated an pop-up advertisement or notification, for example.

Submission + - Shellshock Worm Exploiting Unpatched QNAP NAS Devices (threatpost.com)

Submitted by msm1267
msm1267 writes: A worm exploiting network attached storage devices vulnerable to the Bash flaw is scanning the Internet for more victims.

The worm opens a backdoor on QNAP devices, but to date it appears the attackers are using the exploit to run a click-fraud scam, in addition to maintaining persistence on owned boxes.

“The goal appears to be to backdoor the system, so an attacker could come back later to install additional malware,” said Johannes Ullrich, head of the Internet Storm Center at the SANS Institute.

QNAP of Taiwan released a patch in October for the Bash vulnerability in its Turbo NAS products. Like many other vulnerable products and devices, owners may not be aware that Bash is present and exposed. Bash was among a litany of Internet-wide vulnerabilities uncovered this year; the flaw in Bash, or Bourne Again Shell, affects Linux and UNIX distributions primarily, but also Windows in some cases. Bash is accessed, often quietly, by any number of functions which makes comprehensive patching difficult even though all major Linux distributions and most vendors have issued patches.

Submission + - 'Lax' Crossdomain Policy Puts Yahoo Mail At Risk (threatpost.com)

Submitted by msm1267
msm1267 writes: A researcher disclosed a problem with a loose cross-domain policy for Flash requests on Yahoo Mail that put email message content, contact information and much more at risk. The researcher said the weakness is relatively simple to exploit and puts users at high risk for data loss, identity theft, and more.

Yahoo has patched one issue related to a specific .swf file hosted on Yahoo’s content delivery network that contained a vulnerability that could give an attacker complete control over Yahoo Mail accounts cross origin. While the patch fixed this specific issue, the larger overall configuration issue remains, meaning that other vulnerable .swf files hosted outside the Yahoo CDN and on another Yahoo subdomain could be manipulated the same way.

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