The Anatomy of Unsecure Configuration: Reality Bites
As a penetration tester, I encounter interesting problems with network devices and software. The most common problems that I notice in my work are configuration issues. In today’s security environment, we can accept that a zero-day exploit results in system compromise because details of the vulnerability were unknown earlier. But, what about security issues and problems that have been around for a long time and can’t seem to be eradicated completely? I believe the existence of these types of issues shows that too many administrators and developers are not paying…
2012 Vulnerability Disclosure Retrospective
Vulnerabilities, the bugbear of system administrators and security analysts alike, keep on piling up – ruining Friday nights and weekends around the world as those tasked with fixing them work against ever shortening patch deadlines. In recent years the burden of patching vulnerable software may have felt to be lessening; and it was, if you were to go by the annual number of vulnerabilities publicly disclosed. However, if you thought 2012 was a little more intense than the previous half-decade, you’ll…
S4x13 Conference
S4 is my favorite conference. This is mainly because it concentrates on industrial control systems security, which I am passionate about. I also enjoy the fact that the presentations cover mostly advanced topics and spend very little time covering novice topics. Over the past four years, S4 has become more of a bits and bytes conference with presentations that explain, for example, how to upload Trojan firmwares to industrial controllers and exposés that cover vulnerabilities (in the “insecure by design” and “ICS-CERT” sense of the word). This year’s…
You cannot trust social media to keep your private data safe: Story of a Twitter vulnerability
I‘m always worried about the private information I have online. Maybe this is because I have been hacking for a long time, and I know everything can be hacked. This makes me a bit paranoid. I have never trusted web sites to keep my private information safe, and nowadays it is impossible to not have private information published on the web, such as a social media web site. Sooner or later you could get hacked, this is a fact. Currently, many web and mobile applications give users the option…
When a Choice is a Fingerprint
We frequently hear the phrase “Attribution is hard.” And yes, if the adversary exercises perfect tradecraft, attribution can be hard to the point of impossible. But we rarely mention the opposite side of that coin, how hard it is to maintain that level of tradecraft over the lifetime of an extended operation. How many times out of muscle memory have you absent-mindedly entered one of your passwords in the wrong application? The consequences of this are typically nonexistent if you’re entering your personal email address into your work client, but…
Offensive Defense
I presented before the holiday break at Seattle B-Sides on a topic I called “Offensive Defense.” This blog will summarize the talk. I feel it’s relevant to share due to the recent discussions on desktop antivirus software (AV) What is Offensive Defense? The basic premise of the talk is that a good defense is a “smart” layered defense. My “Offensive Defense” presentation title might be interpreted as fighting back against your adversaries much like the Sexy Defense talk my co-worker Ian Amit has been presenting. My view of…
The Demise of Desktop Antivirus
Are you old enough to remember the demise of the ubiquitous CompuServe and AOL CD’s that used to be attached to every computer magazine you ever brought between the mid-80’s and mid-90’s? If you missed that annoying period of Internet history, maybe you’ll be able to watch the death of desktop antivirus instead. 65,000 AOL CD’s as art Just as dial-up subscription portals and proprietary “web browsers” represent a yester-year view of the Internet, desktop antivirus is similarly being confined…
Exploits, Curdled Milk and Nukes (Oh my!)
Throughout the second half of 2012 many security folks have been asking “how much is a zero-day vulnerability worth?” and it’s often been hard to believe the numbers that have been (and continue to be) thrown around. For the sake of clarity though, I do believe that it’s the wrong question… the correct question should be “how much do people pay for working exploits against zero-day vulnerabilities?” The answer in the majority of cases tends to be “it depends on who’s buying and what the vulnerability is” regardless of the…
Impressions from Ekoparty
Another ekoparty took place in Buenos Aires, Argentina, and for a whole week, Latin America had the chance to meet and get in touch with the best researchers in this side of the world. A record-breaking number of 150 entries were received and analysed by the excellent academic committee formed by Cesar Cerrudo, Nico Waisman, Sebastian Muñiz, Gerardo Richarte, Juliano Rizzo. There were more than 1500 people who enjoyed of 20 talks without any interruption, except when the Mariachis played. Following last year’s ideas, when ekoparty became the last bastion…
Stripe CTF 2.0 Write-Up
Hello, World! I had the opportunity to play and complete the 2012 Stripe CTF 2.0 this weekend. I would have to say this was one of the most enjoyable CTF’s I’ve played by far. They did an excellent job. I wanted to share with you a detailed write-up of the levels, why they’re vulnerable, and how to exploit them. It’s interesting to see how multiple people take different routes on problems, so I’ve included some of the solutions by Michael Milvich (IOActive), Ryan O’Horo(IOActive), Ryan Linn(Spiderlabs), as well as my own (Joseph…