__________________________________________________________ The U.S. Department of Energy Computer Incident Advisory Capability ___ __ __ _ ___ / | /_\ / \___ __|__ / \ \___ __________________________________________________________ INFORMATION BULLETIN Prolog Manager Vulnerability [US-CERT Vulnerability Note VU#120593] December 18, 2007 15:00 GMT Number S-089 ______________________________________________________________________________ PROBLEM: The Meridian Prolog Manager does not use strong encryption when transmitting authentication credentials to clients. PLATFORM: Prolog manager DAMAGE: An attacker who can intercept network traffic containing the Prolog Manager databse may be able to read arbitrary authentication credentials that are stored in the database. SOLUTION: There is currently no solution. Please see bulletin below for suggestion. ______________________________________________________________________________ VULNERABILITY The risk is LOW. An attacker who can intercept network traffic ASSESSMENT: containing the Prolog Manager databse may be able to read arbitrary authentication credentials that are stored in the database. ______________________________________________________________________________ LINKS: CIAC BULLETIN: http://www.ciac.org/ciac/bulletins/s-089.shtml ORIGINAL BULLETIN: http://www.kb.cert.org/vuls/id/120593 ______________________________________________________________________________ [***** Start US-CERT Vulnerability Note VU#120593 *****] Vulnerability Note VU#120593 Prolog Manager uses weak authentication to store authentication credentials Overview The Meridian Prolog Manager does not use strong encryption when transmitting authentication credentials to clients. I. Description The Meridian Prolog Manager is a set of project management tools that are designed to interface with a Microsoft SQL server. When a user logs into Prolog Manager the authentication credentials of all users are sent to the workstation. Administrators can choose to use one of the following methods to encrypt the passwords in Prolog database: no encryption standard encryption enhanced encryption The Prolog Manager does not use strong encryption when an administrator chooses the standard encryption or enhanced encryption options. By default, no encrytion is selected. To exploit this vulnerability, an attacker would need to obtain a copy of the database by sniffing network traffic or by sending an invalid login request to the Prolog Manager server and recording the response. Since usernames are not encrypted in the Prolog database, users are encouraged to use strong passwords. II. Impact An attacker who can intercept network traffic containing the Prolog Manager database may be able to read arbitrary authentication credentials that are stored in the database. III. Solution We are currently unaware of a practical solution to this problem. Use database and network encryption Enabling the enhanced encryption option may increase the effort required for an attacker to extract the passwords from the database. See the Meridian November 2004 Product Tip for more information about enabling encryption. Using a VPN when accessing the Prolog Manager server via untrusted networks may prevent an attacker from sniffing network traffic and obtaining the database. Systems Affected Vendor Status Date Updated Meridian Systems Vulnerable 17-Dec-2007 References http://www.meridiansystems.com/newsevents/newsletter/Newsletter_November_04_tip.htm http://www.securityfocus.com/archive/1/484886/30/0/threaded http://www.microsoft.com/protect/yourself/password/create.mspx Credit Information about this vulnerability was posted on the bugtraq mailing list. This document was written by Ryan Giobbi. Other Information Date Public 12/11/2007 Date First Published 12/17/2007 01:13:14 PM Date Last Updated 12/17/2007 CERT Advisory CVE Name Metric 1.77 Document Revision 21 [***** End US-CERT Vulnerability Note VU#120593 *****] _______________________________________________________________________________ CIAC wishes to acknowledge the contributions of US-CERT for the information contained in this bulletin. _______________________________________________________________________________ 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: +1 925-422-8193 (7x24) FAX: +1 925-423-8002 STU-III: +1 925-423-2604 E-mail: ciac@ciac.org Previous CIAC notices, anti-virus software, and other information are available from the CIAC Computer Security Archive. World Wide Web: http://www.ciac.org/ Anonymous FTP: ftp.ciac.org PLEASE NOTE: Many users outside of the DOE, ESnet, and NIH computing communities receive CIAC bulletins. If you are not part of these communities, please contact your agency's response team to report incidents. Your agency's team will coordinate with CIAC. The Forum of Incident Response and Security Teams (FIRST) is a world-wide organization. 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. 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