__________________________________________________________ The U.S. Department of Energy Computer Incident Advisory Capability ___ __ __ _ ___ / | /_\ / \___ __|__ / \ \___ __________________________________________________________ ADVISORY Update on the Vulnerability in innd March 20, 1997 19:00 GMT Number H-43 _____________________________________________________________________________ PROBLEM: Increased activity in attempts to exploit a vulnerability that exists in versions of INN (InterNetNews server) up to and including 1.5.1. PLATFORM: All platforms with INN and its derivatives. DAMAGE: Remote users may run local commands on the server. SOLUTION: CIAC recommends that you immediately verify and correct the configuration of your 1.5.1 upgrade. _____________________________________________________________________________ VULNERABILITY Exploit details involving this vulnerability have been made ASSESSMENT: publicly available. _____________________________________________________________________________ Current Information ------------------- A number of sites have noticed break-in attempts to exploit the innd vulnerability. Spoofing attempts have been forged in the name of trusted individuals who issue "official" USENET messages. Many news sites are configured to automatically process these messages. The INN daemon processes control messages in a script. This automatic process combined with the error in version 1.5 allows individuals to run commands on the server. For more details on the vulnerability, reference CIAC Bulletin H-34: Vulnerability in innd. As recommended in the CIAC bulletin, a clean installation of INN 1.5.1 corrects the security flaw. ATTENTION: Other methods to update from a prior version may not replace the vulnerable scripts. They are simply retained as part of the configuration. All configuration and script files should be compared with the current version. The "parsecontrol" script is currently being targeted and should be replaced. Solution -------- Upgrade as recommended in CIAC Bulletin H-34 and compare all configuration files. Specifically, the parsecontrol script should be replaced with correct one supply with the patch. ----------------------------------------------------------------------------- CIAC, the Computer Incident Advisory Capability, is the computer security incident response team for the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) and the emergency backup response team for the National Institutes of Health (NIH). CIAC is located at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in Livermore, California. CIAC is also a founding member of FIRST, the Forum of Incident Response and Security Teams, a global organization established to foster cooperation and coordination among computer security teams worldwide. CIAC services are available to DOE, DOE contractors, and the NIH. CIAC can be contacted at: Voice: +1 510-422-8193 FAX: +1 510-423-8002 STU-III: +1 510-423-2604 E-mail: ciac@llnl.gov For emergencies and off-hour assistance, DOE, DOE contractor sites, and the NIH may contact CIAC 24-hours a day. During off hours (5PM - 8AM PST), call the CIAC voice number 510-422-8193 and leave a message, or call 800-759-7243 (800-SKY-PAGE) to send a Sky Page. CIAC has two Sky Page PIN numbers, the primary PIN number, 8550070, is for the CIAC duty person, and the secondary PIN number, 8550074 is for the CIAC Project Leader. Previous CIAC notices, anti-virus software, and other information are available from the CIAC Computer Security Archive. World Wide Web: http://ciac.llnl.gov/ Anonymous FTP: ciac.llnl.gov (128.115.19.53) Modem access: +1 (510) 423-4753 (28.8K baud) +1 (510) 423-3331 (28.8K baud) CIAC has several self-subscribing mailing lists for electronic publications: 1. CIAC-BULLETIN for Advisories, highest priority - time critical information and Bulletins, important computer security information; 2. CIAC-NOTES for Notes, a collection of computer security articles; 3. SPI-ANNOUNCE for official news about Security Profile Inspector (SPI) software updates, new features, distribution and availability; 4. SPI-NOTES, for discussion of problems and solutions regarding the use of SPI products. Our mailing lists are managed by a public domain software package called ListProcessor, which ignores E-mail header subject lines. 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A list of FIRST member organizations and their constituencies can be obtained via WWW at http://www.first.org/. This document was prepared as an account of work sponsored by an agency of the United States Government. Neither the United States Government nor the University of California nor any of their employees, makes any warranty, express or implied, or assumes any legal liability or responsibility for the accuracy, completeness, or usefulness of any information, apparatus, product, or process disclosed, or represents that its use would not infringe privately owned rights. Reference herein to any specific commercial products, process, or service by trade name, trademark, manufacturer, or otherwise, does not necessarily constitute or imply its endorsement, recommendation or favoring by the United States Government or the University of California. The views and opinions of authors expressed herein do not necessarily state or reflect those of the United States Government or the University of California, and shall not be used for advertising or product endorsement purposes. LAST 10 CIAC BULLETINS ISSUED (Previous bulletins available from CIAC) H-33: HP-UX ftpd/kftpd Vulnerability H-34: Vulnerability in innd H-35: HP-UX vgdisplay command Vulnerability H-36: Solaris 2.x CDE sdtcm_convert Vulnerability H-37: Solaris 2.x passwd buffer Overrun Vulnerability H-38A: Internet Explorer 3.x Vulnerabilities H-39: SGI IRIX fsdump Vulnerability H-40: DIGITAL Security Vulnerabilities (DoP, delta-time) H-41: Solaris 2.x eject Buffer Overrun Vulnerability H-42: HP MPE/iX with ICMP Echo Request (ping) Vulnerability