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Spam-proofing the mail system

One of the major problems with Simple Mail Transport Protocol (SMTP) is that it allows email senders to forge information about who they are. The lack of sender authentication allows unscrupulous users to send email that appears to come from a domain other than where it truly originates. Spammers use this 'feature' to disguise their email and to cause any bounces or responses to be handled by someone else.

There are several proposals for combating this problem that are currently being worked on; we will describe some of them below. Before we do, however, a bit of a review on how SMTP currently works is in order.

When a host wants to send mail, it looks at the DNS Mail Exchanger (MX) record for the destination domain and makes a connection to the host that is indicated. The sending host identifies itself, the email address of the sender of the message, and the address of the recipient of the message to the destination host via SMTP messages. This is known as the envelope of the message and, if it is accepted by the destination host, the sender proceeds to send the body of the message. The message body contains RFC822 headers (From:, To:, Subject:, etc.) that are used by Mail User Agents (MUAs) to identify the message to users. SMTP servers traditionally do not do any kind of checking on the envelope data they receive, believing that other hosts will not deceive them. Any part of the envelope and RFC822 headers can be forged (except, of course, the recipient in the envelope). Obviously, SMTP has its roots in a much friendlier Internet where trusting other hosts was the norm.

Recently, Yahoo announced an initiative that is meant to combat spam called Domain Keys. Technical details are somewhat sketchy, but the basic idea is that the DNS records for a domain would include a public key. Email that originates from that domain would use the corresponding private key to encrypt some data (it is not clear exactly what, but a cryptographic hash of the message contents would seem an obvious choice) that would be placed in an email header. Mail Transfer Agents (MTAs) that received the message could decrypt it using the public key in the DNS record and if the decrypted value was correct, the MTA would know that the message originated from the domain that was claimed.

Sender Permitted From (SPF) is a proposal to add information to the DNS records for a domain specifying what machines legitimately send email for that domain. This information is the reverse of the MX record, rather than specifying hosts that receive email for the domain, they specify hosts that send it. This would allow MTAs to check the IP address of the sender and the host name provided in the SMTP envelope along with the SPF information in DNS to determine whether that IP address is a legitimate sender for that domain. (LWN covered SPF in more detail last October).

The Trusted Email Open Standard (TEOS) is a wide-ranging proposal that has three implementation steps and would eventually allow for third-party certification of email messages as coming from a trusted source. This scheme would operate in some ways like the SSL Certificate Signing Authorities; an MTA could verify that a message came from a source trusted by the third party. The first step that TEOS proposes is similar to the Domain Keys proposal; it would provide a way to authenticate email senders. The second stage adds the ability for senders to make assertions about the contents of the email, saying, for example, that it contains advertising or an opt-in mailing, or that the sender and recipient have a business or family relationship. Users would be able to filter the mail based on the assertions (or lack thereof). If the sender incorrectly categorizes a message, the authentication will not allow the blame to be shifted elsewhere, providing a large incentive to be truthful when making the assertions.

The Tripoli proposal envisions an entirely new email infrastructure, at first running in parallel with the current SMTP-based system, but eventually supplanting it. The underlying principle is that the receiver of email should have greater control than any of the other parties involved, including the sender, ISPs that transmit the email, or governments. The system proposed would eventually have end-to-end encryption for all email traffic. Associated with each email would be a cryptographic token that is certified by a third-party to a particular level of authentication; email recipients could then choose the level of authentication that they wish to require and can reject any messages that fall below this standard.

These proposals are a testament to just how problematic and widespread the spam problem has become. The scope of some of these proposals, particularly TEOS and Tripoli, show how far some people are willing to go to try and combat it. Adding third-parties to email sending could have a number of security and privacy concerns and would almost certainly add a cost to sending email. If that cost breaks the current economic model of spamming, however, it may be effective, but it would also impact lots of other bulk email uses today (legitimate mailing list traffic, opt-in newsletters and the like). On the other hand, Domain Keys and SPF could be circumvented by spammers willing to create throwaway domains that conform to the requirements. Once the domains are identified as spam domains, they can be added to blacklists, of course, but there have been any number of problems with that particular solution as well. Authenticating senders might help track down spammers, but until the risk of detection and the cost of conviction are greatly increased, it is likely to only slow things down and perhaps not by much.

It should be interesting to watch the battle over our email inboxes play out over the next few years. It may well be that one or more of these proposals is adopted (or some combination of them) by a significant portion of email users and providers. Unfortunately, in the meantime, less technical email users are suffering at the hands of the spammers to the point where email is no longer a useful communications medium for many.

Comments (22 posted)

New vulnerabilities

lftp buffer overflows

Package(s):	lftp	CVE #(s):	CAN-2003-0963
Created:	December 15, 2003	Updated:	February 13, 2004
Description:	According to this advisory versions of lftp prior to 2.6.10 are vulnerable to two exploitable buffer overflow problems. Both occur when you connect to a web server with lftp using HTTP or HTTPS, and then use lftp's "ls" or "rels" commands on specially prepared directories on the web server.
Alerts:	Slackware SSA:2003-346-01 2003-12-12 Immunix IMNX-2003-73-002-01 2003-12-09 SuSE SuSE-SA:2003:051 2003-12-15 Fedora FEDORA-2003-034 2003-12-15 Mandrake MDKSA-2003:116 2003-12-15 Red Hat RHSA-2003:403-01 2003-12-16 Red Hat RHSA-2003:404-01 2003-12-16 OpenPKG OpenPKG-SA-2003.053 2003-12-17 Gentoo 200312-07 2003-12-16 Debian DSA-406-1 2004-01-05 Conectiva CLA-2004:800 2004-01-06 Whitebox WBSA-2003:404-01 2003-12-17

Comments (none posted)

xchat: remotely exploitable denial of service vulnerability

Package(s):	xchat	CVE #(s):
Created:	December 15, 2003	Updated:	December 17, 2003
Description:	There is a remotely exploitable bug in xchat 2.0.6 that could lead to a denial of service attack. This is caused by sending a malformed DCC packet to xchat 2.0.6, causing it to crash. Versions prior to 2.0.6 do not appear to be affected by this bug. For more information, please see this advisory.
Alerts:	Gentoo 200312-06 2003-12-14

Comments (none posted)

Updated vulnerabilities

2.4 kernel - several vulnerabilities

Package(s):	2.4 kernel	CVE #(s):	CAN-2003-0461 CAN-2003-0462 CAN-2003-0464 CAN-2003-0476 CAN-2003-0501 CAN-2003-0550 CAN-2003-0551 CAN-2003-0552
Created:	July 21, 2003	Updated:	December 23, 2003
Description:	Several security issues have been discovered affecting the Linux kernel: CAN-2003-0461: /proc/tty/driver/serial reveals the exact character counts for serial links. This could be used by a local attacker to infer password lengths and inter-keystroke timings during password entry. CAN-2003-0462: Paul Starzetz discovered a file read race condition existing in the execve() system call, which could cause a local crash. CAN-2003-0464: A recent change in the RPC code set the reuse flag on newly-created sockets. Olaf Kirch noticed that his could allow normal users to bind to UDP ports used for services such as nfsd. CAN-2003-0476: The execve system call in Linux 2.4.x records the file descriptor of the executable process in the file table of the calling process, allowing local users to gain read access to restricted file descriptors. CAN-2003-0501: The /proc filesystem in Linux allows local users to obtain sensitive information by opening various entries in /proc/self before executing a setuid program. This causes the program to fail to change the ownership and permissions of already opened entries. CAN-2003-0550: The STP protocol is known to have no security, which could allow attackers to alter the bridge topology. STP is now turned off by default. CAN-2003-0551: STP input processing was lax in its length checking, which could lead to a denial of service. CAN-2003-0552: Jerry Kreuscher discovered that the Forwarding table could be spoofed by sending forged packets with bogus source addresses the same as the local host.
Alerts:	Red Hat RHSA-2003:238-01 2003-07-21 EnGarde ESA-20032407-018 2003-07-24 Debian DSA-358-1 2003-07-31 Debian DSA-358-3 2003-08-04 Debian DSA-358-2 2003-08-05 SuSE SuSE-SA:2003:034 2003-08-12 Debian DSA-358-4 2003-08-13 Gentoo 200308-01 2003-08-14 Red Hat RHSA-2003:408-00 2003-12-19

Comments (none posted)

CUPS: denial of service

Package(s):	CUPS	CVE #(s):	CAN-2003-0788
Created:	November 3, 2003	Updated:	March 4, 2004
Description:	Paul Mitcheson reported a situation where the CUPS Internet Printing Protocol (IPP) implementation in CUPS versions prior to 1.1.19 would get into a busy loop. This could result in a denial of service. In order to exploit this bug an attacker would need to have the ability to make a TCP connection to the IPP port (by default 631).
Alerts:	Red Hat RHSA-2003:275-01 2003-11-03 Mandrake MDKSA-2003:104 2003-11-05 Conectiva CLA-2003:779 2003-11-07 SCO Group CSSA-2004-012.0 2004-03-03

Comments (none posted)

FreeRADIUS: Denial of service vulnerability

Package(s):	FreeRADIUS	CVE #(s):	CAN-2003-0967
Created:	December 10, 2003	Updated:	December 10, 2003
Description:	Versions of FreeRADIUS through 0.9.2 have a vulnerability wherein a remote attacker can cause the daemon to crash.
Alerts:	Red Hat RHSA-2003:386-01 2003-12-10

Comments (none posted)

Net-SNMP: security bugs in versions before 5.0.9

Package(s):	Net-SNMP	CVE #(s):	CAN-2003-0935
Created:	December 2, 2003	Updated:	February 13, 2004
Description:	The Net-SNMP project includes various Simple Network Management Protocol (SNMP) tools. A security issue in Net-SNMP versions before 5.0.9 could allow an existing user/community to gain access to data in MIB objects that were explicitly excluded from their view. Version 5.0.9 of Net-SNMP is not vulnerable to this issue. In addition, Net-SNMP 5.0.9 fixes a number of other minor bugs.
Alerts:	Red Hat RHSA-2003:335-01 2003-12-02 Mandrake MDKSA-2003:115 2003-12-11 Red Hat RHSA-2004:023-01 2004-01-15 Whitebox WBSA-2004:023-01 2004-02-12

Comments (none posted)

Pan: denial of service

Package(s):	Pan	CVE #(s):	CAN-2003-0855
Created:	November 25, 2003	Updated:	December 10, 2003
Description:	Pan is a Gnome/GTK+ newsreader. A bug in Pan versions prior to 0.13.4 can cause Pan to crash when parsing an article header containing a very long author email address. This bug causes a crash (denial of service) but is not further exploitable.
Alerts:	Red Hat RHSA-2003:311-01 2003-11-24 Red Hat RHSA-2003:312-01 2003-12-10

Comments (none posted)

Multiple-use vulnerability in Safe.pm

Package(s):	Safe.pm	CVE #(s):	CAN-2002-1323
Created:	October 9, 2002	Updated:	February 20, 2004
Description:	usePerl has a description of a vulnerability in the Safe.pm Perl module. It seems that if a Safe compartment is used more than once, it ceases to be safe. The problem is fixed in Safe 2.08.
Alerts:	Debian DSA-208-1 2002-12-12 OpenPKG OpenPKG-SA-2002.014 2002-12-16 Trustix 2002-0087 2002-12-19 Gentoo 200212-6 2002-12-20 SCO Group CSSA-2004-007.0 2004-02-20

Comments (none posted)

apache: buffer overflows in mod_alias, mod_rewrite

Package(s):	apache	CVE #(s):	CAN-2003-0542 CAN-2003-0789
Created:	October 28, 2003	Updated:	February 13, 2004
Description:	André Malo discovered buffer overflows in the mod_alias and mod_rewrite modules of the Apache webserver. These occurred if a regular expression with more than 9 capturing parenthesis was configured. To exploit this, an attacker would need to be able to locally create a carefully crafted configuration file (.htaccess or httpd.conf). CAN-2003-0542 Another buffer overflow in Apache 2.0.47 and earlier in mod_cgid's mishandling of CGI redirect paths could result in CGI output going to the wrong client when a threaded MPM is used. CAN-2003-0789.
Alerts:	OpenPKG OpenPKG-SA-2003.046 2003-10-28 Immunix IMNX-2003-7+-025-01 2003-10-28 Gentoo 200310-04 2003-10-31 Mandrake MDKSA-2003:103 2003-11-03 EnGarde ESA-20031105-030 2003-11-05 Slackware SSA:2003-308-01 2003-11-03 Conectiva CLA-2003:775 2003-11-05 Trustix 2003-0041 2003-11-15 Gentoo 200310-03 2003-10-28 Red Hat RHSA-2003:360-01 2003-12-10 Red Hat RHSA-2003:320-01 2003-12-16 Red Hat RHSA-2003:405-00 2003-12-18 Fedora FEDORA-2003-004 2004-01-08 Whitebox WBSA-2004:015-01 2004-02-12

Comments (none posted)

apache2: Denial of Service vulnerability

Package(s):	apache2	CVE #(s):
Created:	September 29, 2003	Updated:	March 25, 2004
Description:	A problem was discovered in Apache2 where CGI scripts that write more than 4k to the standard error stream will hang the script's execution. This problem can lead to a denial of service situation. See this bug report for additional details.
Alerts:	Mandrake MDKSA-2003:096 2003-09-26 Mandrake MDKSA-2003:096-1 2003-10-24 Netwosix NW-2004-0006 2004-03-25 Gentoo 200403-04 2004-03-22

Comments (none posted)

bind: cache poisoning

Package(s):	bind	CVE #(s):	CAN-2003-0914
Created:	November 26, 2003	Updated:	February 19, 2004
Description:	A cache poisoning vulnerability in BIND may be exploited causing a temporary denial of service until the bad record expires from the cache.
Alerts:	EnGarde ESA-20031126-031 2003-11-26 Immunix IMNX-2003-7+-024-01 2003-10-27 Trustix 2003-0044 2003-11-27 SuSE SuSE-SA:2003:047 2003-11-28 Debian DSA-409-1 2004-01-05 SCO Group CSSA-2004-003.0 2004-02-19

Comments (none posted)

cvs: unauthorized file creation

Package(s):	cvs	CVE #(s):
Created:	December 9, 2003	Updated:	December 17, 2003
Description:	Stable CVS 1.11.10 has been released, fixing a security issue with no known exploits (as of this writing) that could cause previous versions of CVS to attempt to create files and directories in the filesystem root. This release also fixes several issues relevant to case insensitive filesystems and some other bugs.
Alerts:	Mandrake MDKSA-2003:112 2003-12-08 Mandrake MDKSA-2003:112-1 2003-12-10 Gentoo 200312-04 2003-12-08 Slackware SSA:2003-345-01 2003-12-11 OpenPKG OpenPKG-SA-2003.052 2003-12-17

Comments (none posted)

ethereal: multiple remote and local vulnerabilities

Package(s):	ethereal	CVE #(s):	CAN-2003-0925 CAN-2003-0926 CAN-2003-0927
Created:	November 10, 2003	Updated:	December 17, 2003
Description:	Multiple vulnerabilities have been found in ethereal versions below 0.9.16. Remote attackers can craft packets, and local users can build corrupt trace files, resulting denial of service and remote code execution.
Alerts:	Conectiva CLA-2003:780 2003-11-07 Red Hat RHSA-2003:323-01 2003-11-10 Gentoo 200311-04 2003-11-22 Fedora FEDORA-2003-022 2003-11-25 Mandrake MDKSA-2003:114 2003-12-10

Comments (none posted)

Filename disclosure vulnerability in fam

Package(s):	fam	CVE #(s):	CAN-2002-0875
Created:	August 19, 2002	Updated:	January 5, 2005
Description:	"fam" (file alteration monitor) watches files and directories for changes and lets interested applications know when something happens. This package has a flaw in its group handling that blocks some legitimate operations while, at the same time, exposing the names of files that should otherwise be invisible.
Alerts:	Debian DSA-154-1 2002-08-15 Red Hat RHSA-2005:005-01 2005-01-05

Comments (none posted)

fetchmail may crash on specially crafted message

Package(s):	fetchmail	CVE #(s):	CAN-2003-0792
Created:	October 16, 2003	Updated:	April 8, 2004
Description:	A bug was discovered in fetchmail 6.2.4 where a specially crafted email message can cause fetchmail to crash.
Alerts:	Mandrake MDKSA-2003:101 2003-10-16 Slackware SSA:2003-300-02 2003-10-22 SCO Group CSSA-2004-004.0 2004-02-19 Netwosix NW-2004-0002 2004-02-20 Gentoo 200403-10 2004-03-30 OpenPKG OpenPKG-SA-2004.012 2004-04-08

Comments (none posted)

fileutils/wu-ftpd: denial of service

Package(s):	fileutils	CVE #(s):	CAN-2003-0854
Created:	October 22, 2003	Updated:	March 2, 2004
Description:	There is, it seems, an integer overflow vulnerability in "ls" which can be exploited via wu-ftpd to create a denial of service situation. See this advisory from Georgi Guninski for details.
Alerts:	Conectiva CLA-2003:768 2003-10-22 Conectiva CLA-2003:771 2003-10-24 Immunix IMNX-2003-7+-026-01 2003-10-31 Red Hat RHSA-2003:309-01 2003-11-03 Mandrake MDKSA-2003:106 2003-11-12 Trustix 2003-0042 2003-11-15 SCO Group CSSA-2004-006.0 2004-03-01

Comments (none posted)

glibc: DNS stub resolvers contain buffer overflow vulnerability

Package(s):	glibc	CVE #(s):	CAN-2002-1146
Created:	November 7, 2002	Updated:	February 5, 2004
Description:	DNS stub resolvers from multiple vendors contain a buffer overflow vulnerability. The impact of this vulnerability appears to be limited to denial of service. (See CERT Vulnerability Note VU#738331) The BIND 4 and BIND 8.2.x stub resolver libraries, and other libraries such as glibc 2.2.5 and earlier, libc, and libresolv, uses the maximum buffer size instead of the actual size when processing a DNS response, which causes the stub resolvers to read past the actual boundary ("read buffer overflow"), allowing remote attackers to cause a denial of service (crash).
Alerts:	Red Hat RHSA-2002:197-06 2002-10-03 Red Hat RHSA-2002:197-09 2002-11-06 Mandrake MDKSA-2004:009 2004-02-04

Comments (none posted)

GnuPG: ElGamal signing keys compromised

Package(s):	gnupg	CVE #(s):	CAN-2003-0971
Created:	November 28, 2003	Updated:	March 3, 2004
Description:	A severe vulnerability was discovered in GnuPG by Phong Nguyen relating to ElGamal sign+encrypt keys. This email message from Werner Koch contains more information. "Phong Nguyen identified a severe bug in the way GnuPG creates and uses ElGamal keys for signing. This is a significant security failure which can lead to a compromise of almost all ElGamal keys used for signing. Note that this is a real world vulnerability which will reveal your private key within a few seconds."
Alerts:	Mandrake MDKSA-2003:109 2003-11-28 SuSE SuSE-SA:2003:048 2003-12-03 Conectiva CLA-2003:798 2003-12-09 Red Hat RHSA-2003:390-01 2003-12-10 Red Hat RHSA-2003:395-01 2003-12-10 Fedora FEDORA-2003-025 2003-12-10 Gentoo 200312-05 2003-12-12 Debian DSA-429-1 2004-01-26 Debian DSA-429-2 2004-02-13 SCO Group CSSA-2004-009.0 2004-03-02

Comments (3 posted)

gtkhtml: malformed messages cause crash

Package(s):	gtkhtml	CVE #(s):	CAN-2003-0133 CAN-2003-0541
Created:	April 14, 2003	Updated:	April 18, 2005
Description:	GtkHTML is the HTML rendering widget used by the Evolution mail reader. GtkHTML supplied with versions of Evolution prior to 1.2.4 contain a bug when handling HTML messages. Alan Cox discovered that certain malformed messages could cause the Evolution mail component to crash.
Alerts:	Red Hat RHSA-2003:126-01 2003-04-14 Mandrake MDKSA-2003:046 2003-04-15 Red Hat RHSA-2003:264-01 2003-09-09 Conectiva CLA-2003:737 2003-09-12 Mandrake MDKSA-2003:093 2003-09-18 Debian DSA-710-1 2005-04-18

Comments (none posted)

iproute: local denial of service

Package(s):	iproute net-tools	CVE #(s):	CAN-2003-0856
Created:	November 25, 2003	Updated:	December 14, 2004
Description:	The iproute utility is susceptible to spoofed netlink messages sent by local users, with the result that denial of service attacks are possible.
Alerts:	Red Hat RHSA-2003:316-01 2003-11-24 Gentoo 200404-10 2004-04-09 Debian DSA-492-1 2004-04-18 Fedora FEDORA-2004-115 2004-05-11 Fedora FEDORA-2004-154 2004-06-03 Mandrake MDKSA-2004:148 2004-12-13

Comments (none posted)

KDE: Two issues in KDM

Package(s):	kde, xfree86	CVE #(s):	CAN-2003-0690 CAN-2003-0692
Created:	September 16, 2003	Updated:	December 19, 2003
Description:	According to this advisory two issues have been discovered in KDM: CAN-2003-0690: Privilege escalation with specific PAM modules. The XDM display manager that ships with XFree86 prior to 4.3 is also vulnerable. CAN-2003-0692: Session cookies generated by KDM are potentially insecure All versions of KDM as distributed with KDE up to and including KDE 3.1.3 are affected.
Alerts:	Red Hat RHSA-2003:269-01 2003-09-16 Mandrake MDKSA-2003:091 2003-09-16 Conectiva CLA-2003:747 2003-09-19 Debian DSA-388-1 2003-09-19 Gentoo 200311-01 2003-11-15 Mandrake MDKSA-2003:118 2003-12-19

Comments (none posted)

kernel: local root exploit in 2.4.22

Package(s):	kernel	CVE #(s):	CAN-2003-0961
Created:	December 1, 2003	Updated:	April 5, 2004
Description:	A vulnerability was discovered in the Linux kernel versions 2.4.22 and previous. A flaw in bounds checking in the do_brk() function can allow a local attacker to gain root privileges. This vulnerability is known to be exploitable. The 2.4.23 kernel contains the fix. For more details on how this vulnerability works, see this LWN article.
Alerts:	Debian DSA-403-1 2003-12-01 Mandrake MDKSA-2003:110 2003-12-01 Trustix 2003-0046 2003-12-01 Red Hat RHSA-2003:392-00 2003-12-01 Slackware SSA:2003-336-01 2003-12-01 Fedora FEDORA-2003-026 2003-12-02 Red Hat RHSA-2003:389-01 2003-12-01 Yellow Dog YDU-20031203-1 2003-12-03 SuSE SuSE-SA:2003:049 2003-12-04 Gentoo 200312-02 2003-12-04 Conectiva CLA-2003:796 2003-12-05 Red Hat RHSA-2003:368-01 2003-12-19 Debian DSA-423-1 2004-01-15 Debian DSA-433-1 2004-02-04 Debian DSA-442-1 2004-02-19 Debian DSA-470-1 2004-04-01 Debian DSA-475-1 2004-04-05

Comments (1 posted)

kernel-utils: setuid vulnerability

Package(s):	kernel-utils	CVE #(s):	CAN-2003-0019
Created:	February 7, 2003	Updated:	January 21, 2005
Description:	The kernel-utils package contains several utilities that can be used to control the kernel or machine hardware. In Red Hat Linux 8.0 this package contains user mode linux (UML) utilities. The uml_net utility in kernel-utils packages with Red Hat Linux 8.0 was incorrectly shipped setuid root. This could allow local users to control certain network interfaces, add and remove arp entries and routes, and put interfaces in and out of promiscuous mode. All users of the kernel-utils package should update to these packages that contain a version of uml_net that is not setuid root. Alternatively, as a work-around to this vulnerability issue the following command as root: chmod -s /usr/bin/uml_net
Alerts:	Red Hat RHSA-2003:056-08 2003-02-07

Comments (none posted)

libnids: remotely exploitable buffer overflow

Package(s):	libnids	CVE #(s):	CAN-2003-0850
Created:	October 29, 2003	Updated:	January 6, 2004
Description:	libnids (a NIDS plugin which emulates the Linux 2.0 IP stack) contains a buffer overflow vulnerability which can be exploited remotely. Version 1.18 fixes the problem.
Alerts:	Conectiva CLA-2003:773 2003-10-29 Gentoo 200311-07 2003-11-22 Debian DSA-410-1 2004-01-05

Comments (none posted)

libpng, libpng3: buffer overflow

Package(s):	libpng, libpng3	CVE #(s):	CAN-2002-1363
Created:	December 19, 2002	Updated:	July 14, 2004
Description:	Glenn Randers-Pehrson discovered a problem in connection with 16-bit samples from libpng, an interface for reading and writing PNG (Portable Network Graphics) format files. The starting offsets for the loops are calculated incorrectly which causes a buffer overrun beyond the beginning of the row buffer.
Alerts:	Debian DSA-213-1 2002-12-19 Red Hat RHSA-2003:006-06 2003-01-09 SuSE SuSE-SA:2003:0004 2003-01-14 Yellow Dog YDU-20030114-2 2002-01-14 OpenPKG OpenPKG-SA-2003.001 2003-01-15 Mandrake MDKSA-2003:008 2003-01-20 Conectiva CLA-2003:564 2003-01-23 Red Hat RHSA-2004:249-01 2004-06-18 Fedora FEDORA-2004-173 2004-06-18 Fedora FEDORA-2004-175 2004-06-18 Fedora FEDORA-2004-174 2004-06-18 Fedora FEDORA-2004-176 2004-06-18 Whitebox WBSA-2004:249-01 2004-06-21 Mandrake MDKSA-2004:063 2004-06-29 OpenPKG OpenPKG-SA-2004.030 2004-07-06 Gentoo 200407-06 2004-07-08

Comments (none posted)

mikmod: buffer overflow

Package(s):	mikmod	CVE #(s):	CAN-2003-0427
Created:	June 16, 2003	Updated:	June 16, 2005
Description:	Ingo Saitz discovered a bug in mikmod whereby a long filename inside an archive file can overflow a buffer when the archive is being read by mikmod.
Alerts:	Debian DSA-320-1 2003-06-13 Gentoo 200307-01 2003-07-02 Fedora FEDORA-2005-404 2005-06-09 Red Hat RHSA-2005:506-01 2005-06-13 Fedora FEDORA-2005-405 2005-06-16

Comments (none posted)

mpg123: heap overflow

Package(s):	mpg123	CVE #(s):	CAN-2003-0865
Created:	November 12, 2003	Updated:	February 19, 2004
Description:	Versions of mpg123 through 0.59s contain a heap overflow which may be exploited remotely (by a hostile server). See this advisory for details.
Alerts:	Conectiva CLA-2003:781 2003-11-12 Debian DSA-435-1 2004-02-06 SCO Group CSSA-2004-002.0 2004-02-19

Comments (none posted)

mplayer: remotely exploitable buffer overflow vulnerability

Package(s):	mplayer	CVE #(s):	CAN-2003-0835
Created:	September 29, 2003	Updated:	April 6, 2004
Description:	A remotely exploitable buffer overflow vulnerability was found in MPlayer. A malicious host can craft a harmful ASX header, and trick MPlayer into executing arbitrary code upon parsing that header. Read the full advisory for details.
Alerts:	Gentoo 200309-15 2003-09-27 Mandrake MDKSA-2003:097 2003-09-30 Conectiva CLA-2003:760 2003-10-06 Gentoo 200403-13 2004-03-31 Mandrake MDKSA-2004:026 2004-04-05

Comments (none posted)

Nessus NASL scripting engine security issues

Package(s):	nessus	CVE #(s):
Created:	May 27, 2003	Updated:	August 12, 2004
Description:	Some some vulnerabilities exsist in the Nessus NASL scripting engine. To exploit these flaws, an attacker would need to have a valid Nessus account as well as the ability to upload arbitrary Nessus plugins in the Nessus server (this option is disabled by default) or he/she would need to trick a user somehow into running a specially crafted nasl script. Read the full advisory for additional information.
Alerts:	Gentoo 200305-10 2003-05-27

Comments (none posted)

nfs-utils xlog() off-by-one bug

Package(s):	nfs-utils	CVE #(s):	CAN-2003-0252
Created:	July 14, 2003	Updated:	March 8, 2004
Description:	Linux NFS utils package contains remotely exploitable off-by-one bug. A local or remote attacker could exploit this vulnerability by sending specially crafted request to rpc.mountd daemon. See this BugTraq post for more details.
Alerts:	Red Hat RHSA-2003:206-01 2003-07-14 Debian DSA-349-1 2003-07-14 Slackware SSA:2003-195-01 2003-07-14 SuSE SuSE-SA:2003:031 2003-07-15 Immunix IMNX-2003-7+-018-01 2003-07-14 Slackware SSA:2003-195-01b 2003-07-15 Yellow Dog YDU-20030718-1 2003-07-18 Gentoo 200307-07 2003-07-19 Mandrake MDKSA-2003:076 2003-07-21 Conectiva CLA-2003:700 2003-07-22 SCO Group CSSA-2003-037.0 2003-11-17 Trustix TSLSA-2004-0009 2004-03-05

Comments (none posted)

openssh: timing attack leads to information disclosure

Package(s):	openssh	CVE #(s):	CAN-2003-0190
Created:	May 2, 2003	Updated:	November 30, 2004
Description:	From the advisory: "During a pen-test we stumbled across a nasty bug in OpenSSH-portable with PAM support enabled (via the --with-pam configure script switch). This bug allows a remote attacker to identify valid users on vulnerable systems, through a simple timing attack. The vulnerability is easy to exploit and may have high severity, if combined with poor password policies and other security problems that allow local privilege escalation."
Alerts:	Gentoo 200305-01 2002-03-05 Gentoo 200305-02 2003-05-13 Red Hat RHSA-2003:222-01 2003-07-29 OpenPKG OpenPKG-SA-2003.035 2003-08-06 Ubuntu USN-34-1 2004-11-30

Comments (1 posted)

postfix: denial of service vulnerabilities

Package(s):	postfix	CVE #(s):	CAN-2003-0468 CAN-2003-0540
Created:	August 5, 2003	Updated:	May 27, 2004
Description:	The postfix MTA, versions through 1.1.12 (but not 2.0) is subject to two remotely exploitable denial of service vulnerabilities; see this advisory from Michal Zalewski for details.
Alerts:	Debian DSA-363-1 2003-08-03 Red Hat RHSA-2003:251-01 2003-08-04 SuSE SuSE-SA:2003:033 2003-08-04 Conectiva CLA-2003:717 2003-08-04 EnGarde ESA-20030804-019 2003-08-04 Mandrake MDKSA-2003:081 2003-08-04 Trustix 2003-0029 2003-08-04 Mandrake MDKA-2004:028 2004-05-26

Comments (none posted)

proftpd: remote root shell

Package(s):	proftpd	CVE #(s):	CAN-2003-0831
Created:	September 24, 2003	Updated:	January 2, 2004
Description:	The ASCII translation mechanism in ProFTPD 1.2.8 contains a vulnerability which will provide a remote attacker with a root shell - if the attacker is able to download a specially-crafted file. See this ISS advisory for more information.
Alerts:	Slackware SSA:2003-259-02 2003-09-23 OpenPKG OpenPKG-SA-2003.043 2003-09-25 Mandrake MDKSA-2003:095 2003-09-26 Trustix 2003-0037 2003-09-27 Gentoo 200309-16 2003-09-28 Conectiva CLA-2003:750 2003-09-29 Mandrake MDKSA-2003:095-1 2003-12-31

Comments (2 posted)

rsync - remotely exploitable heap overflow

Package(s):	rsync	CVE #(s):	CAN-2003-0962
Created:	December 4, 2003	Updated:	March 3, 2004
Description:	An advisory has gone out warning of a remotely exploitable heap overflow vulnerability in rsync versions 2.5.6 and prior. If you are running an rsync server, you will want to apply a distributor patch or upgrade to 2.5.7 in the near future.
Alerts:	Slackware SSA:2003-337-01 2003-12-03 Trustix 2003-0048 2003-12-04 SuSE SuSE-SA:2003:050 2003-12-04 OpenPKG OpenPKG-SA-2003.051 2003-12-04 Debian DSA-404-1 2003-12-04 EnGarde ESA-20031204-032 2003-12-04 Gentoo 200312-03 2003-12-04 Conectiva CLA-2003:794 2003-12-04 Fedora FEDORA-2003-030 2003-12-04 Red Hat RHSA-2003:398-01 2003-12-04 Red Hat RHSA-2003:399-01 2003-12-04 Mandrake MDKSA-2003:111 2003-12-04 Immunix IMNX-2003-73-001-01 2003-12-05 SCO Group CSSA-2004-010.0 2004-03-02

Comments (none posted)

sane-backends: several vulnerabilities

Package(s):	sane-backends	CVE #(s):	CAN-2003-0773 CAN-2003-0774 CAN-2003-0775 CAN-2003-0776 CAN-2003-0777 CAN-2003-0778
Created:	September 11, 2003	Updated:	February 20, 2004
Description:	Alexander Hvostov, Julien Blache and Aurelien Jarno discovered several security-related problems in the sane-backends package, which contains an API library for scanners including a scanning daemon (in the package libsane) that can be remotely exploited. These problems allow a remote attacker to cause a segfault fault and/or consume arbitrary amounts of memory. The attack is successful, even if the attacker's computer isn't listed in saned.conf. You are only vulnerable if you actually run saned e.g. in xinetd or inetd. If the entries in the configuration file of xinetd or inetd respectively are commented out or do not exist, you are safe. Try "telnet localhost 6566" on the server that may run saned. If you get "connection refused" saned is not running and you are safe. The Common Vulnerabilities and Exposures project identifies the following problems: CAN-2003-0773: saned checks the identity (IP address) of the remote host only after the first communication took place (SANE_NET_INIT). So everyone can send that RPC, even if the remote host is not allowed to scan (not listed in saned.conf). CAN-2003-0774: saned lacks error checking nearly everywhere in the code. So connection drops are detected very late. If the drop of the connection isn't detected, the access to the internal wire buffer leaves the limits of the allocated memory. So random memory "after" the wire buffer is read which will be followed by a segmentation fault. CAN-2003-0775: If saned expects strings, it mallocs the memory necessary to store the complete string after it receives the size of the string. If the connection was dropped before transmitting the size, malloc will reserve an arbitrary size of memory. Depending on that size and the amount of memory available either malloc fails (->saned quits nicely) or a huge amount of memory is allocated. Swapping and OOM measures may occur depending on the kernel. CAN-2003-0776: saned doesn't check the validity of the RPC numbers it gets before getting the parameters. CAN-2003-0777: If debug messages are enabled and a connection is dropped, non-null-terminated strings may be printed and segmentation faults may occur. CAN-2003-0778: It's possible to allocate an arbitrary amount of memory on the server running saned even if the connection isn't dropped. At the moment this can not easily be fixed according to the author. Better limit the total amount of memory saned may use (ulimit).
Alerts:	Debian DSA-379-1 2003-09-11 Red Hat RHSA-2003:278-01 2003-10-07 Mandrake MDKSA-2003:099 2003-10-09 Conectiva CLA-2003:769 2003-10-22 SuSE SuSE-SA:2003:046 2003-11-18 SCO Group CSSA-2004-005.0 2004-02-19

Comments (none posted)

screen: privilege escalation

Package(s):	screen	CVE #(s):	CAN-2003-0972
Created:	November 28, 2003	Updated:	March 3, 2004
Description:	According to this advisory a buffer overflow in GNU screen allows privilege escalation for local users. Usually screen is installed either setgid-utmp or setuid-root. It also has some potential for remote attacks or getting control of another user's screen. The problem is that you have to transfer around 2-3 gigabytes of data to user's screen to exploit this vulnerability. 4.0.1, 3.9.15 and older versions are vulnerable.
Alerts:	OpenPKG OpenPKG-SA-2003.050 2003-11-28 Mandrake MDKSA-2003:113 2003-12-08 Debian DSA-408-1 2004-01-05 Conectiva CLA-2004:809 2004-01-20 Fedora-Legacy FLSA:1187 2004-01-26 SCO Group CSSA-2004-011.0 2004-03-02

Comments (none posted)

File overwrite vulnerability in tar and unzip

Package(s):	tar unzip	CVE #(s):	CAN-2001-1267 CAN-2001-1268 CAN-2001-1269 CAN-2002-0399
Created:	October 1, 2002	Updated:	April 9, 2006
Description:	The tar utility does not properly filter file names containing "../", meaning that a hostile archive can, if unpacked by an unsuspecting user, overwrite any file that is writable by that user. GNU tar versions 1.13.19 and earlier are vulnerable; unzip through version 5.42 has the same vulnerability.
Alerts:	Red Hat RHSA-2002:096-24 2002-09-18 Gentoo tar-20021001 2002-10-01 Gentoo unzip-20021001 2002-10-01 EnGarde ESA-20021003-022 2002-10-03 Mandrake MDKSA-2002:065 2002-10-10 Mandrake MDKSA-2002:066 2002-10-10 Conectiva CLA-2002:538 2002-10-29 Red Hat RHSA-2006:0195-01 2006-02-21 Fedora-Legacy FLSA:183571-1 2006-04-04

Comments (1 posted)

Multiple vendor telnetd vulnerability

Package(s):	telnet Telnet netkit-telnet-ssl kerberos telnetd netkit-telnet nkitb/nkitserv/telnetd krb5	CVE #(s):
Created:	May 21, 2002	Updated:	October 5, 2004
Description:	This vulnerability, originally thought to be confined to BSD-derived systems, was first covered in the July 26th Security Summary. It is now known that Linux telnet daemons are vulnerable as well.
Alerts:	SCO Group CSSA-2001-030.0 2001-08-10 Conectiva CLA-2001:413 2001-08-24 Debian DSA-075-1 2001-08-14 Debian DSA-075-2 2001-08-14 HP HPSBTL0202-023 2002-02-12 Mandrake MDKSA-2001:068 2001-08-13 Mandrake MDKSA-2001:093 2001-12-17 Progeny PROGENY-SA-2001-27 2001-08-14 Red Hat RHSA-2001:099-06 2001-08-09 Red Hat RHSA-2001:099-09 2002-02-07 Red Hat RHSA-2001:100-02 2001-08-09 Slackware sl-997726350 2001-08-09 SuSE SuSE-SA:2001:029 2001-09-03 Yellow Dog YDU-20010810-1 2001-08-10 Yellow Dog YDU-20010810-2 2001-08-10 Gentoo 200410-03 2004-10-05

Comments (none posted)

vim - modeline vulnerability

Package(s):	vim	CVE #(s):	CAN-2002-1377
Created:	January 16, 2003	Updated:	February 10, 2004
Description:	VIM allows a user to set the modeline differently for each edited text file by placing special comments in the files. Georgi Guninski found that these comments can be carefully crafted in order to call external programs. This could allow an attacker to create a text file such that when it is opened arbitrary commands are executed.
Alerts:	Red Hat RHSA-2002:297-17 2003-01-15 OpenPKG OpenPKG-SA-2003.003 2003-01-21 Gentoo 200301-13 2003-01-22 Yellow Dog YDU-20030127-3 2003-01-27 Mandrake MDKSA-2003:012 2003-02-03 Conectiva CLA-2004:812 2004-02-10

Comments (4 posted)

wget: buffer overflow

Package(s):	wget	CVE #(s):	CAN-2003-1565
Created:	August 5, 2003	Updated:	December 10, 2003
Description:	The wget utility contains a buffer overflow which, when exploited with an over-long URL, can enable arbitrary code execution.
Alerts:	Conectiva CLA-2003:716 2003-08-04 SCO Group CSSA-2003-025.0 2003-10-03 Red Hat RHSA-2003:372-01 2003-12-10

Comments (1 posted)

zebra: denial of service vulnerability

Package(s):	zebra	CVE #(s):	CAN-2003-0795 CAN-2003-0858
Created:	November 13, 2003	Updated:	January 7, 2004
Description:	Zebra an open source implementation of TCP/IP routing software. Jonny Robertson reported that Zebra can be remotely crashed if a Zebra password has been enabled and a remote attacker can connect to the Zebra telnet management port. The Common Vulnerabilities and Exposures project (cve.mitre.org) has assigned the name CAN-2003-0795 to this issue. Herbert Xu reported that Zebra can accept spoofed messages sent on the kernel netlink interface by other users on the local machine. This could lead to a local denial of service attack. The Common Vulnerabilities and Exposures project (cve.mitre.org) has assigned the name CAN-2003-0858 to this issue.
Alerts:	Red Hat RHSA-2003:307-01 2003-11-13 Conectiva CLA-2003:786 2003-11-20 OpenPKG OpenPKG-SA-2003.049 2003-11-25 Debian DSA-415-1 2004-01-06

Comments (none posted)

Resources

December CRYPTO-GRAM newsletter

Bruce Schneier's CRYPTO-GRAM newsletter for December is out. It looks at whether the Blaster worm caused the August 14 blackout (he thinks it may have), electronic voting, and products using quantum cryptography. "I don't have any hope for this sort of product. I don't have any hope for the commercialization of quantum cryptography in general; I don't believe it solves any security problem that needs solving. I don't believe that it's worth paying for, and I can't imagine anyone but a few technophiles buying and deploying it."

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