Walsh: Introducing the SELinux Sandbox

Posted May 27, 2009 3:35 UTC (Wed) by JoeBuck (guest, #2330)
In reply to: Walsh: Introducing the SELinux Sandbox by spender
Parent article: Walsh: Introducing the SELinux Sandbox

So you're saying, instead of trying to limit the damage of root exploits, eliminate every possible root exploit instead? It's not going to happen, not unless kernel hackers stop all development other than security bug fixes.

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Walsh: Introducing the SELinux Sandbox

Posted May 27, 2009 22:14 UTC (Wed) by spender (guest, #23067) [Link] (20 responses)

That's not what I'm saying. Also, you made the unsubstantiated assumption that putting "some focus on improving the security of the kernel" means "security bug fixes" and then attributed that assumption to me so that you could dismiss it (straw man).

What I'm saying is, I hope the people pushing SELinux get out of the habit of throwing around phrases that exaggerate the effectiveness of SELinux or suggest that it provides a guarantee of anything. I made the same request years ago when I published my local root exploit that disabled SELinux (and every other LSM security module) -- that apparently had no effect on them, nor has the recently published remote root + SELinux disabling exploit.

There's no better demonstration in my mind of the importance of improving the kernel's security than the fact that it was possible to disable SELinux remotely with a single 4-byte write. A proper response to the exploit should have been to look at the techniques used (which surely will be duplicated in future exploits as the code is public) and see what could be done to prevent them. Instead it was 'business-as-usual' for the vendors: just fix the remotely exploitable vulnerability that we classified as a denial-of-service (as is done with nearly all exploitable vulnerabilities for which there doesn't exist public code exploiting them), hope nobody makes a fuss about it, and move on.

Maybe I haven't looked hard enough, but I can't find any article from a vendor promoting SELinux that discusses the reality of what it can do. I just did a random google search for SELinux MLS and came up with:
http://www.centos.org/docs/5/html/Deployment_Guide-en-US/...
It's a document written by Red Hat talking about how SELinux can be used to keep untrusted users with access to unclassified information from ever being able to access top secret information. Given the above mentioned remote root exploit, using SELinux for such a purpose is both frightening and irresponsible. I'm not exaggerating at all here; here's an entire paragraph straight out of the article:

"Some organizations go as far as to purchase dedicated systems for each security level. This is often prohibitively expensive, however. A mechanism is required to enable users at different security levels to access systems simultaneously, without fear of information contamination."

This irresponsible mindset isn't confined to SELinux: there are others who erroneously believed that information of different security levels could be compartmentalized by using virtual machines. It should be clear from the above mentioned exploits for Xen and VMWare that this view is just as foolish.

As a good contrast to the "claim it's provably secure and that x can never read/write y" approach to security features, I recently spotted Kees Cook's blog at:
http://www.outflux.net/blog/archives/2009/05/14/nx-emulat...
where he was talking about adding exec-shield to Ubuntu, while calling it NX emulation in the case where hardware NX support wasn't present. I pointed out to him that this was misleading, and gave several examples of how it provides substantially weaker protection than a hardware NX implementation. He quickly verified my claims, and furthermore found what is likely another vulnerability in exec-shield which allowed for executable heaps (though I haven't verified it myself). After this, he made the responsible decision to call it "partial NX emulation" instead.

A reasonable view like that is what's needed in Red Hat's article above. Instead of offering software as a replacement for air-gap and suggesting there's "no fear of information contamination," the caveats of the approach should be mentioned (any at all, there are none whatsoever discussed in that article). You'll save the cost of hardware and maintenance of a machine, at the potential cost of the information residing on the machine.

To wrap this up, back to what I mentioned earlier about improving the security of the kernel and how this doesn't have to do with fixing individual bugs. If you look at what's been done in terms of preventing exploitation of security vulnerabilities in userland (NX, ASLR, PIE, RELRO, SSP, etc) similar things can be done for the kernel. Kernel hackers don't have to stop all development, the changes are transparent to the user, and the protections apply to both current vulnerabilities and vulnerabilities introduced in the future.

Some of PaX's features are already tackling these problems, and continue to improve (in fact, an upcoming change to PaX will defeat the technique used by sgrakkyu's remote root SELinux-disabling exploit to easily switch from interrupt context to process context). Among the already existing features (in addition to security-improving changes for which no configurable option exists) are KERNEXEC, MEMORY_UDEREF, MEMORY_SANITIZE, REFCOUNT, RANDKSTACK, and USERCOPY.

-Brad

Walsh: Introducing the SELinux Sandbox

Posted May 28, 2009 6:44 UTC (Thu) by nix (subscriber, #2304) [Link] (4 responses)

So... let me get this straight. To you this entire argument isn't about
whether SELinux is an effective sandbox (it is, modulo kernel bugs, and
local attackers might be impeded somewhat by having to do all their work
through a pipe that getting local access might be harder than before: your
requirement for total kernel security is ridiculous on its face and
counter to the security philosophy that you espouse elsewhere in the *same
message*, of strength in depth). It isn't about how much ease of use it
brings over plain unadorned SELinux, if any (which is what the article was
actually about).

It's about the *phrasing of the release announcement*?! Do you seriously
think that so many people are going to read it and use the sandbox code
(as opposed to, say, picking up F11 and getting it by default without
reading that announcement at all) that what they think after reading the
announcement will make *any* difference to security?

Do you seriously think, after twenty-plus years of viruses, that *anyone*
believes *any* vendor's claim that *anything* is totally secure? (In any
case, that assertion was not made in this case: 'more secure' than an
SELinux that guards only system daemons it surely is). The public are not
idiots and aren't going to be reading this release note in enough numbers
to affect security in any case.

You have a nerve talking about straw men when your entire argument is
based on a misreading and you contradict yourself in a single post.

Walsh: Introducing the SELinux Sandbox

Posted May 28, 2009 12:16 UTC (Thu) by spender (guest, #23067) [Link] (3 responses)

Yes, the argument is mostly about phrasing, because despite your inability to accept it, it does matter. It's not just about this single announcement, but rather about *every* announcement, discussion, or documentation about SELinux. You can see how effective the propaganda is when you look at how SELinux is discussed by users. Look at how often words like "proven" or "can only" are thrown around when talking about SELinux -- you yourself used "proven" multiple times. Do you use these same kinds of phrases when talking about NX or ASLR? It's quite silly to say a technology is "proven" or that it makes sure a process "can only" do something, modulo [list of things that bypass it].

If people aren't buying the propaganda, as you claim, then why is SELinux being offered as a replacement for air gap among people who don't know any better. Either no such users of the air gap replacement exist (which reality says is false), or they do exist (they do). Are you claiming that putting unclassified data on the same physical machine as top secret data is a good idea and a person doing so can be "without fear of information contamination"? Those aren't my words, they're Red Hat's -- and whether you want to believe it or not, people *are* buying it. I'd really like to hear your answer to this question, actually.

Nowhere did I make a requirement for "total kernel security" -- I simply made the point that you can't claim guarantees or "proven models" unless there actually does exist some guarantee or proof, which in this case there does not and cannot.

You failing at reading comprehension and putting words into my mouth does not a contradiction make.

-Brad

I'll give you credit, but how much?

Posted May 28, 2009 17:39 UTC (Thu) by hozelda (guest, #19341) [Link] (1 responses)

I know few real details of the Linux kernel or of SELinux, but what Brad criticizes in these comments, at least on the surface, seems completely correct.

To be precise, if SELinux is ever changed or if any part of what SELinux depends on working properly ever changes in behavior, then one has to redo the "proof". Maybe this proof redo will be easy for most changes that happen in practice, but maybe not.

In any case, what is the code that must be audited and proven correct for SELinux to work as intended? That would have to be identified and locked down so that any weaknesses could not be introduced by changing anything else. [Eg, if hacking some part of the kernel with the sole intention to compromise the system is done, then that should not affect the "SELinux promise" unless that part being hacked was included as being needed to be locked down.]

I suspect there are too many assumptions being taken by those that would say SELinux is bulletproof. Software is not hardware. Has the hardware and the hardware creation processes and tools been audited?

Now, in practice, it would be a long list to document all the (eg, hardware) assumptions needed for SELinux to work as well as, eg, we might believe is the alternative of isolating data on different machines "not connected" with each other.

Then again, have we proven how many vendors sell a solution where they prove all of their product's requisites? There is an awfully lot of physics that must be documented or at least the assumptions stated. And this says nothing about physics we can't know we don't know about. Truly I don't believe anything is "proven" unless you talk within a limited context. We don't need a degree in philosophy to keep finding potential shortcomings with any system claimed to be perfect.

In short, I think the assumptions should be stated, if not on the glossy brochures main pages, at least on a little comment somewhere. Then again, most people that would identify some of these issues would challenge any vendor claiming some system was provably perfect, in order to weed out the actual assumptions being made. Brad might be going too far and might be playing devil's advocate ad infinitum, perhaps picking on Linux or FOSS because he has allegiances elsewhere. [?]

From what I have heard, the vast majority of the US government or likely virtually 100.0% [note an implied margin or error] of all other institutions out there do not have such high requirements. In these case, a risk analysis would probably reveal weaker links than an SELinux. In these cases, some of the hidden assumptions might be known or else taken for granted no matter the vendor.

Now, let's move the spotlight to Brad completely to wrap up this comment. Does Brad know of any provably secure system, for example? Has his best choice (not counting SELinux) stated their assumptions fully? Could I get access to these assumptions and the proofs? [eg, to the full blueprints for how such a system could ever possibly behave (given its assumptions) with a full analysis of what was believed to be the pertinent physics? And some analysis of what would happen if any of the assumptions were found not to hold?]

Are we all putting things into perspective AND trying to be honest about assumptions, or is perhaps each side failing? When you talk proving security, only the most open of systems could ever honestly attempt to engage in that conversation. Does a system that is really open exist (at hardware, software,... all levels)? Does it even make sense to speak of proofs when referring to physical systems?

I'll give you credit, but how much?

Posted May 28, 2009 20:40 UTC (Thu) by spender (guest, #23067) [Link]

I'll try to answer all the questions you asked in your post.

As for what code needs to be audited for SELinux to work as it's claimed to, that's not really useful in reality, as:
1) Development on the kernel would have to stop (or the code would have to be audited constantly, which isn't cheap)
2) Auditors aren't perfect
3) The problem is architectural; as James said further down on this page (the first time I've seen an admission like this from anyone at Red Hat, but my memory may be wrong): "SELinux cannot be expected to protect against kernel vulnerabilities, because it is part of the kernel."

Indeed, most vendors exaggerate the abilities of their products. The most egregious example I can think of right now is anti-virus software; but being as the parent article is about SELinux, I talked about SELinux (with some mention of Xen and VMWare as well).

Regarding "Brad might be [...] perhaps picking on Linux or FOSS because he has allegiances elsewhere. [?]", as I (and the PaX team too for that matter) have spent just about every day for the past 8 years working on free software to improve Linux security, that's a little insulting -- but I imagine you weren't aware of that (no problem).

I don't know of any provably secure OS -- surely it wouldn't be anything like the OSes people actually use if one did exist. It's not really useful to entertain this idea; what's useful is thinking about how to improve things in ways that don't add complexity or burden on a user. Achieving higher levels of security is useful, raising the cost of developing an exploit by making exploitation techniques more difficult and complex is useful.

It's especially important now with the 2.6 development model (moreso than it was with the 2.4 series of kernels) that greater considerations be made for security in the kernel itself. I've mentioned this on previous articles, but it goes without saying that when you have a ~80MB patch of new code/changed code/removed code every 3 months, there are a lot of vulnerabilities being introduced. It's been made clear by the kernel developers that there's no intention of changing the development model, so instead of just accepting the problem and continuing in the "fix vulnerabilities that get reported to us, release a 'stable' update once a week" mindset, something more can be done.

You mentioned "weaker links than an SELinux" -- I don't know if there was a typo involved there, but I don't want to give the impression that SELinux is a weak link. Considering the length of time it's been around, its code quality has been better than most, with only a handful of vulnerabilities reported (though some were silently fixed, like the remote DoS from 2005 (I think) that I mentioned several months back. It was discussed among the vendors on a private list, noting that attacks had been seen in the wild, but still no CVE or announcement was released -- I assume because at the time the attacks had been discovered, the bug had already been fixed). Restricting what files, etc a process can access is useful too as not all vulnerabilities involve memory corruption/arbitrary code execution. In that respect, it's a good complement to the NX+ASLR protections already in place. But again, it's important to realize the limitations of the technologies so that levels of risk can be properly evaluated.

-Brad

Walsh: Introducing the SELinux Sandbox

Posted May 28, 2009 18:01 UTC (Thu) by hozelda (guest, #19341) [Link]

>> If people aren't buying the propaganda, as you claim, then why is SELinux being offered as a replacement for air gap among people who don't know any better.

Who do you believe doesn't know better that was addressed by Red Hat? And since when has the air been that good at preventing information from propagating?

Most customers fairly serious about security who would take any vendor's word on perfection would seek out certifications "just to be safe." [And note that many customers have claimed to value security yet have taken the word of vendors that keep their systems closed source!]

And even with certifications, look at what can happen: http://cryptome.org/ed-curry.htm . Customers may "want" security, but most apparently speak a different language when it comes to making purchases so are willing to trust vendors and look the other way.

Anyway, for the sake of approaching intellectual honesty, the SELinux vendors (and everyone) should consider telling the whole story [and closed source vendors should stop trying to push their wares on security conscience buyers since they aren't even willing to meet the basics of transparency and peer review].

Walsh: Introducing the SELinux Sandbox

Posted May 28, 2009 18:57 UTC (Thu) by hozelda (guest, #19341) [Link] (1 responses)

Brad, I want to repeat, so that it's clear, that I agree with your position of not letting the largest (or any) vendor selling Linux get away with making outrageous claims; however, I need to make sure a balanced view comes out.. and I want to look a little closer at your "evidence".

Well, to add balance, I want to again state that no vendor should step up to the plate if they won't at a minimum open up their blueprints. Red Hat may talk however they want, but I believe they are putting all their cards on the table for the customer and the world to verify as much as they want. This is in stark contrast to the many vendors that try to hide exclusively behind pulling off a certification (all tests can be beaten) or worse.

[You quoting] >> Given the above mentioned remote root exploit, using SELinux for such a purpose is both frightening and irresponsible. I'm not exaggerating at all here; here's an entire paragraph straight out of the article:

[You quoting] >> "Some organizations go as far as to purchase dedicated systems for each security level. This is often prohibitively expensive, however. A mechanism is required to enable users at different security levels to access systems simultaneously, without fear of information contamination."

That paragraph concludes, "A mechanism is required to enable users at different security levels to access systems simultaneously, without fear of information contamination."

It does not conclude that SELinux version anything.anything on arbitray hardware is nirvana. That paragraph makes no allegations about a product, or for that matter about any model.

In fact, that webpage ends with the following [note the tone and subject]:

>> Efforts are being made to have Linux certified as an MLS operating system. The certification is equivalent to the old B1 rating, which has been reworked into the Labeled Security Protection Profile under the Common Criteria scheme.

I don't think Red Hat is claiming Linux is the Second Coming as it almost appears you allege they are doing.

[You said] >> A reasonable view like that is what's needed in Red Hat's article above. Instead of offering software as a replacement for air-gap and suggesting there's "no fear of information contamination"....

Yeah, unless you point to more "evidence", I am thinking that you misunderstood or misjudged that webpage.

I didn't see Red Hat claiming their product was perfect. The article even refers over and over to models, implicitly by using general terms, and explicitly by actually using the word "model" as it compares.

The entire discussion is very general in details. It is nothing remotely like a proof. It does not at all address the issue of imperfections in implementation or make any claims in this respect.

I already mentioned the certification effort underway (according to the webpage). I do very much doubt ANY certification authority will ever carry out an infallible proof or exhaustive testing, or could be trusted to do so without independent verification.

To conclude, I think you are overestimating the claims that Red Hat is presumably making. It's clear from the type of discussion that they are not offering any claims for an actual product. What they offer is a high level description of the model upon which their product is based. They offer the source code so the customer and the world has an opportunity to separate hype from reality. They possibly offer a certification. It's notable to mention that few vendors offer the entire buildable source code so that others can check up on the glossy hype. Unfortunately, I wish the open source community was advanced enough to be offering the source code to hardware.

Walsh: Introducing the SELinux Sandbox

Posted May 28, 2009 20:07 UTC (Thu) by hozelda (guest, #19341) [Link]

I spotted an opportunity to make a small apology/fix.

The page being discussed http://www.centos.org/docs/5/html/Deployment_Guide-en-US/... does appear to be from a manual that is for an actual product.

Not too much of what I said changes, but let me restate some things.

[I said] >> The entire discussion is very general in details. It is nothing remotely like a proof. It does not at all address the issue of imperfections in implementation or make any claims in this respect.

The discussion is about models mostly and is very high level. However, by being within a manual for a product, unless they clarify elsewhere (see last paragraph of this comment), it can be argued they are representing the product at least at some level.

The page says, "SELinux uses the Bell-La Padula BLP model...."

[I said] >> To conclude, I think you are overestimating the claims that Red Hat is presumably making. It's clear from the type of discussion that they are not offering any claims for an actual product. What they offer is a high level description of the model upon which their product is based. They offer the source code so the customer and the world has an opportunity to separate hype from reality. They possibly offer a certification. It's notable to mention that few vendors offer the entire buildable source code so that others can check up on the glossy hype. Unfortunately, I wish the open source community was advanced enough to be offering the source code to hardware.

Well, they are making claims about a product indirectly, but I think context should show that it is about the general behavior of the product and not a statement that it has been proven that the product behaves as the model described in all circumstances without any exceptions.

I think engineers would read such a high level documentation and recognize that the documentation is the intended behavior and not a promise that the software will abide to the models described therein to perfection.

Red Hat likely disclaims many things in the actual contracts they sign with their customers and customers. I am not familiar with the contracts vendors put forward to be able to compare and contrast them.

Walsh: Introducing the SELinux Sandbox

Posted May 28, 2009 19:31 UTC (Thu) by hozelda (guest, #19341) [Link] (12 responses)

>> What I'm saying is, I hope the people pushing SELinux get out of the habit of throwing around phrases that exaggerate the effectiveness of SELinux or suggest that it provides a guarantee of anything. I made the same request years ago when I published my local root exploit that disabled SELinux (and every other LSM security module) -- that apparently had no effect on them, nor has the recently published remote root + SELinux disabling exploit.

I see two things.

One, Red Hat talks about a model and you talk about an implementation. Your exploits are about bugs and not about the model.

Ironically, I'm fairly sure you aren't even talking about a specific implementation (of a full system or of software) since you mention an exploit from years back, yet talk as if the new system is the same one.

Further, you talk about SELinux as being a level of security and not being the whole system ("disable SELinux"). Using that interpretation, you didn't even show a flaw in the SELinux implementation. You showed a flaw in the software that enables (turns on or off) the SELinux security.

>> Instead it was 'business-as-usual' for the vendors: just fix the remotely exploitable vulnerability that we classified as a denial-of-service (as is done with nearly all exploitable vulnerabilities for which there doesn't exist public code exploiting them), hope nobody makes a fuss about it, and move on.

Do you know of any vendor that make a "fuss" about every bug they fix?

Do you know of a vendor that makes a greater deal about fixing bugs than does Red Hat and, in general, the open source world?

Most other vendors don't even make the slight attempt at "fuss" by showing the world the bug they just fixed. Red Hat and company make a certain fuss about every single bug they fix because they take the time to document them all publicly and keep this ongoing information public as they "move on" to the next job at task.

>> This irresponsible mindset isn't confined to SELinux: there are others who erroneously believed that information of different security levels could be compartmentalized by using virtual machines. It should be clear from the above mentioned exploits for Xen and VMWare that this view is just as foolish.

You should have continued talking about every other virtual machine on the planet.

In fact, mentioning VMWare is redundant since we already know we can't trust closed source companies or their binary-only products.

And speaking of not being able to trust closed source companies (eg, Microsoft) or their products...

>> Some of PaX's features are already tackling these problems, and continue to improve

What in the hxxx is PaX?

I went over to the pac grsecurity etc site. I can't believe you allow (broken) links on your site that possibly suggest you can (a) secure OR (b) independently implement Windows (the latter being an illogical statement).

It's difficult to take you seriously (assuming I was still taking you seriously). Do you honestly think anyone working outside of Microsoft has a shot (a shot, if perhaps even lower than one google to one) at securing Windows?

I am hoping I misunderstood the low content information bits I read on that site and that you will clarify just what statement you are trying to make with respect to anyone being able to secure Windows or else re-implement it (which is a nonsensical statement anyway).

[I'm assuming you own that site. If not, then can you still address these concerns I have since you appear to know a lot about this PaX?]

Walsh: Introducing the SELinux Sandbox

Posted May 28, 2009 20:19 UTC (Thu) by hozelda (guest, #19341) [Link] (7 responses)

[I said] >> One, Red Hat talks about a model and you talk about an implementation. Your exploits are about bugs and not about the model.

Same caveat applies as discussed above: http://lwn.net/Articles/335115/

[I said] >> I went over to the pac grsecurity etc site. I can't believe you allow (broken) links on your site that possibly suggest you can (a) secure OR (b) independently implement Windows (the latter being an illogical statement).

I thought, at the time I wrote the above comment, that the wording on the website was a bit misleading, but if I'd know what PaX was, I might agree that the comments about "Windows .. implementation" on the website refer to PaX and not Windows itself. My bad, I think.

I still want to know if the intention was to suggest that Windows can be secured in any way by a third party.

Walsh: Introducing the SELinux Sandbox

Posted May 28, 2009 21:45 UTC (Thu) by spender (guest, #23067) [Link] (6 responses)

If you want to know what PaX is/does, there's the bunch of documentation on the first link on the page: http://pax.grsecurity.net/docs/
Additional information is in the configuration help for each of its options in the patch itself.

As for the Windows comments in your post(s), I don't see what's so shocking about saying certain third parties have implemented some of same techniques implemented in PaX. Take WehnTrust for instance, which implemented ASLR on Windows (even implementing RANDEXEC through its own version of vma mirroring used in PaX). The source is available -- it's actually a nice piece of work, considering that it's more difficult (but more interesting/rewarding) to implement security in Windows than Linux as you have to get around the problem of not having any source. The person who wrote it now works for Microsoft, which brings me to my next point: the anti-Microsoft view you have of their security is pretty outdated. They've actually been taking security seriously for some time now (which I can't say for the official policies of Linux kernel developers) and employ a large number of really bright security experts (like Matt Miller, the WehnTrust author).

At the same time, it's obviously true that some (or most) of the third party security improvements for Windows claim more than they're actually capable of. There was a particular product I won't mention the name of that claimed detection/prevention of "ret2libc attacks". Since noone else has actually solved this problem yet, I was curious to see what the "protection" entailed. It turned out that the software was just checking to see if the return address for an API call (only the ones it cared about enough to hook) pointed into the stack or to a function prologue -- not true detection/prevention, as it can be worked around by techniques that have been public for years.

I don't envy the monstrous task Microsoft has of improving their security. Any improvements have to be done in such a way that doesn't break application compatibility. Given the amount of software on Windows, most of which only exists in binary form and where many of the authors are long gone -- it's no small feat. In some cases their improvements turn out to be unpopular (UAC) or they have to sacrifice some additional security. This is no different from any other major vendor though -- Red Hat sacrificed some additional security in their Exec-Shield implementation in the name of perceived application compatibility.

-Brad

Walsh: Introducing the SELinux Sandbox

Posted May 29, 2009 1:01 UTC (Fri) by hozelda (guest, #19341) [Link] (5 responses)

Hey Brad, I got a "you are embarrassing yourself" email from someone providing almost no details. You can probably guess how much weight I give emails that are FUD-secretive in nature. [It's my open source mentality, I think.]

In any case, this event reminds me that I am willing to reply on specific points without feeling the obligation to become an expert on every facet of the discussion. This does mean I might misfire, but I encourage anyone to always try to correct errors in postings that bother them enough. This helps the author and the readers coming after that may also not be experts either.

Excuse me if I was harsh and am not aware of all the good work you and anyone else may have done.

>> As for the Windows comments in your post(s), I don't see what's so shocking about saying certain third parties have implemented some of same techniques implemented in PaX.

Nothing wrong. What happened is that I became suspect over your motives and realized that, regardless of your motives, you were providing material that others out of the spotlight could point at to say, "see all that controversy surrounding Linux/SELinux". Taking everything into account, I thought maybe PaX was a product intended to compete directly with SELinux and had to ask just how a third party could ever believe they could solve Microsoft's problems for Microsoft. Some of their "problems" are based on business decisions which involve protecting monopolies -- eg, by keeping source closed and by making it difficult to have the actual interfaces fully resolved by third parties.

Microsoft can certainly try to leverage PaX. We just can't say nearly as much about the final product Microsoft comes up with without having access to the full source.. A single line of code, or a single module certainly, can bypass apparent security. The task of reverse engineering is an art. The test space is virtually infinite and you have a much longer less precise task ahead without the benefit of source code (including of compilers, etc). Some of the prodding is even illegal according to their EULA, meaning that the number of people even attempting such a task will be further limited.

>> considering that it's more difficult (but more interesting/rewarding) to implement security in Windows than Linux as you have to get around the problem of not having any source.

Just want to mention that interesting in one sense is not interesting in another.

>> The person who wrote it now works for Microsoft

See, even that individual probably preferred to see Microsoft's source. I mean there is a reason the FOSS world shares source. "Interesting" is great and all, but..

..show me the source.

>> the anti-Microsoft view you have of their security is pretty outdated

I did not intend to appear to mock their past (too much). I said that *all* closed source vendors are untrustworthy. This is an academic pov. It's like the example you gave where someone made outrageous claims but kept the magic secret.

Put up (the source code) or shut up is my reply to anyone that wants trust, especially when the software is that complex. Open review is the judge.

In Microsoft's case, seeing some code (let's assume we get access) doesn't convince me an iota that this is what they are shipping, so while I could critique, I would not for a second believe I was actually getting the information I would need to make a security decision in the way I could if I had source.

I don't trust closed source (that I can't change and build to verify). I might run the binaries and accept certain risks, however, but that is a different issue to having the confidence the comes only from open source code.

>> They've actually been taking security seriously for some time now (which I can't say for the official policies of Linux kernel developers)..

That's an unfounded statement. Linus and many Linux developers have taken security more seriously than many that will ever pass through Microsoft.

You can't just start taking security seriously after so much has been invested and pretend you care more about security than those that have taken it more seriously from the start.

Microsoft has a long history of deceptive marketing shrewdness. Their engineers are not the ones making statements on behalf of Microsoft. In fact, their engineers don't make the final decisions in any way.

>> and employ a large number of really bright security experts

I would bet a farm that Microsoft cannot match the number of really bright security experts that currently do or will work on Linux. [Academic institutions, private security researchers, major companies with lots of expertise on staff.. etc, all have access to Linux but not to Windows.]

>> Any improvements have to be done in such a way that doesn't break application compatibility.

Every update Microsoft sends out breaks something, generally speaking. Vista was a mess, but you don't have to be that obvious in one large shot to know that lots of things can break when you don't test for them (conduct analysis, etc). Fixing a bug in Windows will break software that was written with that bug in mind, for example.

Microsoft's interest is to their stockholders, not to the users. They don't give users the benefit of source code, for starters. The users have the source to Linux and their own best interests in mind.

Red Hat is kept in check (so long as they stick to their model) by the public, by the wide open source community. Who keeps Microsoft in check? Certainly not the public.

Closed source is magic. I don't trust it.

And everyone who has gone to work at Microsoft apparently also preferred not to take Microsoft at their word but rather wanted to see some source (of course, mere employees cannot expect to have control and knowledge over the final product because of access restrictions and inability to privately verify the bits through their personal compilation checks).

>> In some cases their improvements turn out to be unpopular (UAC) or they have to sacrifice some additional security. This is no different from any other major vendor though -- Red Hat sacrificed some additional security in their Exec-Shield implementation in the name of perceived application compatibility.

You still can't compare what you can't see with what you can.

[Broken record again: You don't know what Microsoft ships. You don't know their bugs or what process gives the final pass over their bits. Ditto for all their updates.]

To finish, I don't intend to be harsh to you. My beef, primarily, is with those that attack FOSS unjustly, eg, with whom I like to call Monopolysoft, with their dirty tactics, false promises, and lack of transparency.

[FWIW, they keep cutting back and losing quality individuals. Customers relying on them, a shrinking number, might not be thinking long term in putting all their eggs into a single basket.]

Walsh: Introducing the SELinux Sandbox

Posted May 29, 2009 2:33 UTC (Fri) by spender (guest, #23067) [Link] (2 responses)

A couple comments:

As mentioned on the PaX site, Microsoft has DEP (their HW-based PAGEEXEC implementation) and (a weak) version of ASLR. I had remembered reading that Server 2008 would prevent a service from respawning for a period of time if it had crashed multiple times within a short period of time (deterring bruteforcing of ASLR -- something vanilla Linux doesn't have yet) but when I went to look for a link about it last, I couldn't find one.

EULAs don't stop security researchers from doing their work, nor does not having the source. Reverse engineering has advanced quite a bit in the past couple years, as well as the state of art in decompilation. Tools like BinDiff makes vulnerability finding in patches much quicker, while the Hex-Rays decompiler does a decent job of turning x86 assembly into C-like code. The Windows implementations of DEP and ASLR are pretty well documented publicly. Several companies have published papers on them and techniques for defeating the protections (for instance, it took a while for both Microsoft and Linux vendors to figure out that having a make_stack_executable() function without any safeguards wasn't such a good idea).

I sometimes wonder if there's a 'bystander effect' or 'free rider problem' involved with the "many eyes makes bugs shallow" view. There's a lot more people having a feeling of security based on the assumption that other people are reviewing the source instead of them, then there are actually people reviewing the source. The reality is, even though you have the kernel source, I'm pretty sure you don't audit it for security vulnerabilities, and if you did, it'd be impossible for you to audit every single line of it yourself. So in the end, you're putting trust in some entity, whether it's Microsoft or Linux vendors. It's naive to think Linux vendors are somehow unlike Microsoft in that they don't care about their stockholders -- everyone's in it for the money.

I wouldn't bet the farm anytime soon (though you've restated the challenge, which was initially Microsoft employees vs employees of Linux vendors, collectively) -- I know quite a number of people in the security industry. I can name several exceptionally bright security experts working for Microsoft, but can only think of one among the Linux vendors, who works for SuSE. Indeed, there are other bright people in the industry that work on Linux security -- Julien Tinnes and Tavis Ormandy come to mind, but neither of them are employed by a Linux vendor. To me, that says something. After all, security should should be the responsibility of the vendor, not Google; just as it's Microsoft's responsibility, not Mcafee's or Symantec's. Also, as far as the commercial security industry goes, there's far more people looking for vulnerabilities in Microsoft's software than there are looking at Linux -- simply because exploiting Microsoft software is more profitable (the same goes for underground exploit writers).

Regarding:
> That's an unfounded statement. Linus and many Linux developers have
> taken security more seriously than many that will ever pass through
> Microsoft.
you've apparently missed several past discussions both on here and LKML. It's pretty much agreed upon by the security industry that the official policy of the kernel developers (intentionally covering up security vulnerabilities by fixing the bugs without mentioning security impact that they're aware of) is damaging to users. Linus was nominated last year for the "Lamest vendor response" award: http://pwnie-awards.org/2008/nominees.html#lamestvendor

You mentioned not knowing about what Microsoft ships in their updates -- in fact, the security industry has a pretty good idea about what's being shipped in the updates. A huge number of exploits are written based on diffing an old binary with a newly patched binary. Though silent fixes could easily work their way into a service pack, it's harder to work one into the small patches that go out each month. The patches that are released are marked as security fixes. Sometimes obviously they get their security classification wrong and rightly get called to task for it. Of course, they seem to do a better job of it (again, this goes back to why it's important for the Linux vendors to have security experts on staff) than the tendency to call most vulnerabilities in the Linux kernel just "denial of service", when they're exploitable in reality. This has been commented on several times by several security experts. Three examples:
http://kernelbof.blogspot.com
http://www.security-express.com/archives/bugtraq/2006-07/...
http://securitywatch.eweek.com/exploits_and_attacks/inter...

> Closed source is magic. I don't trust it.

In summary, everything is magic -- verify ;)

-Brad

Walsh: Introducing the SELinux Sandbox

Posted May 29, 2009 3:10 UTC (Fri) by spender (guest, #23067) [Link]

Small update:
Though I still can't find the original link I read where it discusses "windows service recovery" as a useful/necessary addition to ASLR, I did find: http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc262589.aspx
which shows how it's configured. By default in Windows 2003 and up, a service is allowed to crash 3 times, with a minute in between crashes. After the third crash, the service won't be restarted (thus deterring an ASLR bruteforce).

Given the recent discussions on LKML of quality of randomness for ASLR, I'm surprised no one brought this up. After all, randomness quality isn't of huge concern when nothing stops you from running your exploit as many times as it takes to get the addresses right. Nergal wrote his segvguard module years ago when he wrote his classic ret2libc paper, and similar code has been in grsecurity for years as well. Even if a kernel solution isn't used, it seems like it'd be a good job for a TCP wrapper like xinetd. That still doesn't help suid binaries, though.

-Brad

Walsh: Introducing the SELinux Sandbox

Posted May 29, 2009 5:03 UTC (Fri) by hozelda (guest, #19341) [Link]

The EULA does slow down work.

I also think you might be a little over-enthusiastic if you were suggesting that the reverse engineering jobs being undertaken will rival source code access. Just consider the amount of work produced per unit time by the FOSS world vs. the "useful" work being achieved by the underground or by the research world focused on Windows. Clearly one type of work is much more difficult (ie, the one without source code access).

You have high esteem for the top researchers but perhaps miss out on the value and contributions from those not known in the industry. Not to drag SELinux back into this, but a bug fix can have many repercussions, including fixing security issues in the making (not yet analyzed by black hats or even by expert white hats because of information overload). Many people work on their concept of correctness and don't stop to categorize something as security related.

Remember that it takes much more time to develop an exploit usually than it does to fix the bug. With two competent parties analyzing code, which is more likely to finish first, on average?

In fact, you get something of a race to reporting bugs in the FOSS world (to at least get credit) because it is so much quicker to do this than to build an exploit. In the closed source world, you have lots of time to build the exploit with much time left over to craft a business plan around the series of exploits you will build.

Also, the number of eyeballs matters. There is a reason FOSS is quick to fix problems and many times anticipates them, one way or the other.

Of course, if the reverse engineers had done their jobs (assuming it was easy), then they would be patching Microsoft's software for Microsoft just as quickly as is done for FOSS. [I was being facetious.]

You mentioned all the work being done for Windows. Well, I think as time approaches infinity, we see people moving off Windows and onto the more transparent Linux. Research advances more when you have access to the most information possible and then try to fill in those fewest number of remaining holes. This obvious conclusion is among many not escaping those slowly but surely moving to support and contribute to FOSS.

Mainly with Microsoft software in mind, I say that you don't need to (eg) overflow a stack to subvert security or disrupt privacy. You can do it right under people's noses, and it is difficult to catch this because nothing unordinary is happening among an ocean of more unordinary stuff flashing by at hundreds of millions of ordinary instructions per second or faster.

In short, I am not going to be convinced that the reverse engineering job is keeping a check on Microsoft no matter how many tools you mention, nor am I going to be convinced that reverse engineering is comparable to having source. It's one thing to find flaws (diff to help you out, etc). It's another to verify things are correct or are not misbehaving in places you haven't looked. Finding a gem vs accounting for everything in the land. [And surely, the tools don't get as much information as source code+binaries]

To belabor the point.. RE leads to much more information overload. You filter out much to focus on things of interest. If 80MB source patch for Linux is tough to follow.. if everyone is trusting everyone else to see source as you stated.. then how much more difficult is the case when you don't have source yet have lots of changes in binaries. Remember that binaries are updated while the system is running with no need to announce what is going on. The system software can piggyback on any network conversation in any way it wants. It's too large a space to track which is why just looking at the network is not enough, and the binaries clearly have not been deciphered completely. Spotting problems in diffs is much easier than understanding the base. How well does the research community know the Windows base? I don't think nearly well enough. [Eg, you invoke things that Microsoft themselves have stated about their products rather than pointing to an analysis of their binaries to actually show/prove X or Y property is there. With sarcasm.. Don't the reverse engineers know all about Microsoft products the way we know about Linux? Why can't we point out where Microsoft does this or that in actuality (not in theory nor in their marketing nor in their purposely scrapped projects), as we can for Linux, but instead rely on their cribnotes to the public? What kind of checks are those? Who cares that these dissembling tools have progressed "hugely" recently?]

As concerns Red Hat being a public corp just like Microsoft, I addressed that already by saying that the issue is about checks and balances (we look towards their businesses for that.. one relies on openness the other on closedness) and additionally that Microsoft has monopoly profits to protect.

Walsh: Introducing the SELinux Sandbox

Posted Jun 6, 2009 11:07 UTC (Sat) by willezurmacht (guest, #58372) [Link] (1 responses)

When a person jumps into a discussion which covers topics he isn't particularly knowledgeable of, it's a matter of humility, good manners and taste to avoid making claims and dogmatic statements, like you've done so far.

But, if you are in for being the comic relief here, I welcome you as our special open source Leeroy Jenkins. Neither Brad nor the PaX Team know what they are talking about! Go get 'em, tiger!

Walsh: Introducing the SELinux Sandbox

Posted Jun 6, 2009 16:35 UTC (Sat) by dlang (guest, #313) [Link]

exactly what knowledge do you have of the posters qualifications that makes it so clear that you should ridicule him/her that way?

Walsh: Introducing the SELinux Sandbox

Posted May 28, 2009 22:31 UTC (Thu) by nix (subscriber, #2304) [Link] (3 responses)

In fact, mentioning VMWare is redundant since we already know we can't trust closed source companies or their binary-only products.

More generally, the claim (whether stated or implied is not relevant: this is the claim as everyone understands it) that security systems make is that modulo bugs they provide some level of security. Of course, unless the system is utterly trivial, there are always bugs: but that doesn't mean the system is useless. It just means that it cannot keep out a sufficiently determined attacker.

Brad and PaXTeam assert (although they will doubtless deny this as part of the charmless dance of evasion they both employ whenever their reasoning is faulty) that this renders all such security systems worthless. But this is nonsense. The lock on my front door will not keep out an attacker who is determined enough to wade through plant growth and break my kitchen window. This is easy to detect --- but my house security systems also won't keep out an attacker who cuts through the glass of the patio door, which can be done nearly silently with enough care. The thing is that most attackers simply aren't going to do that: it's difficult and annoying and they're more likely to simply skip the house and go on to the next one, unless this is a targetted attack. The only way to keep out targetted attacks from such people is to go and live on a military base: but that merely opens me to attacks from much more powerful actors, who in time of war are likely to attack the military base and take me out as collateral damage, without even meaning to, but who wouldn't bother attacking a single anonymous house in the suburbs.

If you are under targetted attack by a sufficiently determined and ingenious attacker --- the sort of person Brad appears to be considering, who is willing to search for new remote and local vulnerabilities, write exploits for them, and target specific sites with them --- then you're in serious trouble and the best thing to do is simply get off the net until they go away (this is hardly optimal, but improving it is really up to law enforcement or network infrastructure: there's nothing individuals can sanely do). In the case where the attacker finds an exploit for a new vulnerability and launches mass attacks with it, we are somewhat protected by techniques such as ASLR, which can make many classes of exploit more *likely* to fail: mass attackers are likely to give up and go on to the next host before then. This is exactly the same sort of 'defense in depth' with non-100%-perfect but make-cracks-harder systems that Brad has been disparaging. (The strange thing is that a lot of the defences in grsecurity are of this type, so Brad obviously knows this. I'd be stunned if he didn't, 'cos it's security 101 stuff.)

All this is true no matter what security system you are discussing. All security systems for commodity OSes are really there to keep out mass attacks and attacks by the non-ingenious. Thanksfully, nearly all attacks are of these classes.

Walsh: Introducing the SELinux Sandbox

Posted May 29, 2009 1:14 UTC (Fri) by hozelda (guest, #19341) [Link] (1 responses)

nix, I think you are basically correct, but an attack on a FOSS system is complicated by the fact that users can take active steps at any time to help thwart attacks. These users have a lot more information at their fingertips than those who don't have source code nor an ability to controllably change their system around whenever they feel it is necessary.

It's ridiculous how vulnerable you are when you depend fundamentally on information others are keeping secret from you.

Walsh: Introducing the SELinux Sandbox

Posted May 29, 2009 7:03 UTC (Fri) by nix (subscriber, #2304) [Link]

Yes. Hell, even if they don't know the attack class and can recompile
everything, they can simply randomly perturb their system
(function-neutral changes to ABI, say) or change their architecture:
security through obscurity may be an ugly hack but the number of people
launching attacks on old MIPS boxes is minimal :)

Walsh: Introducing the SELinux Sandbox

Posted May 29, 2009 17:25 UTC (Fri) by Arach (guest, #58847) [Link]

> Brad and PaXTeam assert (although they will doubtless deny this as part
> of the charmless dance of evasion they both employ whenever their
> reasoning is faulty) that this renders all such security systems
> worthless.

Excuse me, but I can't find where one of them asserts anything like that. Would you be so kind to provide a relevant quote or a link, please?