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__________________________________________________________
The U.S. Department of Energy
Computer Incident Advisory Capability
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INFORMATION BULLETIN
Vulnerability in GlimpseHTTP and WebGlimpse cgi-bin Packages
November 14, 1997 22:00 GMT Number I-014
______________________________________________________________________________
PROBLEM: Vulnerabilities have been identified in GlimpseHTTP and
WebGlimpse using the cgi-bin programs in these packages.
PLATFORM: GlimpseHTTP 2.0 (and prior)
WebGlimpse (prior to 1.5)
DAMAGE: If exploited, remote users may be able to execute arbitrary
commands with the privileges of the httpd process which answers
HTTP requests.
SOLUTION: Apply workarounds listed below in Section 3.
______________________________________________________________________________
VULNERABILITY Reports have been received of intruders exploiting these
ASSESSMENT: vulnerabilities. It is recommended that sites that have either
of these packages installed take the steps outlined in Section
3 as soon as possible.
______________________________________________________________________________
[ Start AUSCERT Advisory ]
===========================================================================
AA-97.28 AUSCERT Advisory
Vulnerability in GlimpseHTTP and WebGlimpse cgi-bin Packages
14 November 1997
Last Revised: --
- ----------------------------------------------------------------------------
The Australian Computer Emergency Response Team (AUSCERT) has received
information about vulnerabilities in the GlimpseHTTP and WebGlimpse cgi-bin
packages.
AUSCERT is currently receiving reports of intruders exploiting these
vulnerabilities.
AUSCERT recommends that sites that have either of these packages installed
take the steps outlined in Section 3 as soon as possible.
- ----------------------------------------------------------------------------
1. Description
AUSCERT has received information that vulnerabilities exist in the
GlimpseHTTP and WebGlimpse packages. Both of these packages provide
a web interface which allows you to use Glimpse, an indexing and query
system, to provide a search facility for your web site.
The cgi-bin programs in these packages perform insufficient argument
checking. Due to this, intruders may be able to execute arbitrary
commands with the privileges of the httpd process.
GlimpseHTTP 2.0 is known to be vulnerable in this fashion. The authors
of GlimpseHTTP and WebGlimpse also believe earlier versions of both
GlimpseHTTP (prior to 2.0) and WebGlimpse (prior to 1.5) may be
vulnerable to similar attacks. WebGlimpse version 1.5 addresses the
vulnerabilities in both of these packages.
In particular, AUSCERT is receiving reports of attacks using the
aglimpse cgi-bin program (part of GlimpseHTTP). To check whether
exploitation of the GlimpseHTTP vulnerability has been attempted
against your site, search for accesses to the aglimpse program in your
access logs. An example of how to do this is:
# egrep -i 'aglimpse.*(\||IFS)' {WWW_HOME}/logs/access_log
Where {WWW_HOME} is the base directory for your web server.
If this command returns anything, further investigation is necessary.
Both GlimpseHTTP and WebGlimpse are commonly used packages and sites
are encouraged to check for aglimpse (part of GlimpseHTTP) and
webglimpse (part of WebGlimpse). If either GlimpseHTTP or WebGlimpse
is installed it is recommended that the workarounds given in section
3 are applied.
Up-to-date information regarding this vulnerability has been made
available by the authors of GlimpseHTTP and WebGlimpse. It is
available from:
http://glimpse.cs.arizona.edu/security.html
2. Impact
Remote users may be able to execute arbitrary commands with the
privileges of the httpd process which answers HTTP requests. This
may be used to compromise the http server and under certain
configurations gain privileged access.
3. Workarounds/Solution
GlimpseHTTP 2.0 is known to be affected by the vulnerability described
in this advisory. The authors of GlimpseHTTP and WebGlimpse also
believe earlier versions of both GlimpseHTTP (prior to 2.0) and
WebGlimpse (prior to 1.5) should be considered vulnerable to similar
attacks.
Information on removing the GlimpseHTTP and WebGlimpse vulnerabilities
described in this advisory may be found in Sections 3.2 and 3.3.
Until these packages can be upgraded it is advised that the functionality
provided by these packages be disabled (Section 3.1).
3.1 Remove execute permissions
To prevent the exploitation of the vulnerabilities described in this
advisory, AUSCERT recommends that the execute permissions for all
cgi-bin programs associated with GlimpseHTTP and WebGlimpse be removed.
Note that this will have the side effect of preventing the search
facilities provided by these packages from functioning.
3.2 Replacing GlimpseHTTP with WebGlimpse
GlimpseHTTP is no longer supported and its authors recommend that
sites replace it with the current version of the WebGlimpse package
(see Section 3.3). Sites should ensure that all programs related to
GlimpseHTTP are removed or disabled prior to installing the WebGlimpse
package.
3.3 Upgrading to the current version of WebGlimpse
A new version of WebGlimpse has been released which addresses the
vulnerabilities described in this advisory. Sites using WebGlimpse
should upgrade to the current version, which at the moment is 1.5
(released on 13 November 1997). It can be retrieved from:
ftp://ftp.cs.arizona.edu/glimpse/webglimpse-1.5.src.tar.gz
More information on WebGlimpse may be found at:
http://glimpse.cs.arizona.edu/webglimpse/
4. Additional measures
It is important to note that attacks similar to this may succeed
against any CGI program which has not been written with due consideration
for security. Sites using HTTP servers, and in particular CGI
applications, are encouraged to develop an understanding of the security
issues involved.
Sites should consider taking this opportunity to examine their httpd
configuration and web servers. In particular, all CGI programs that
are not required should be removed, and all those remaining should be
examined for possible security vulnerabilities.
It is also important to ensure that all child processes of httpd are
running as a non-privileged user. This is often a configurable option.
See the documentation for your httpd distribution for more details.
Numerous resources relating to WWW security are available. The following
pages may provide a useful starting point. They include links describing
general WWW security, secure httpd setup and secure CGI programming.
W3C Security Resources (including WWW Security FAQ):
http://www.w3.org/Security/
NSCA's "Security Concerns on the Web" Page:
http://hoohoo.ncsa.uiuc.edu/security-1.0/
The following books contain useful information on Web security
including sections on secure programming techniques.
"Web Security Sourcebook", Aviel Rubin, Daniel Geer and Marcus Ranum,
John Wiley & Sons, Inc., 1997.
"Web Security & Commerce", Simson Garfinkel with Gene Spafford,
O'Reilly and Associates, 1997.
CERT/CC have also produced a document describing how to sanitise
user-supplied data to cgi-bin programs. This can be retreived from:
ftp://ftp.cert.org/pub/tech_tips/cgi_metacharacters
ftp://ftp.auscert.org.au/pub/cert/tech_tips/cgi_metacharacters
Please note that the URLs and books referenced in this advisory are
not under AUSCERT's control and therefore AUSCERT cannot be responsible
for their availability or content.
- ----------------------------------------------------------------------------
AUSCERT thanks Udi Manber and CERT/CC for their assistance in the
preparation of this advisory. Thanks also to Stephane Bortzmeyer for the
initial report to the authors of GlimpseHTTP.
- ----------------------------------------------------------------------------
The AUSCERT team have made every effort to ensure that the information
contained in this document is accurate. However, the decision to use the
information described is the responsibility of each user or organisation.
The appropriateness of this document for an organisation or individual
system should be considered before application in conjunction with local
policies and procedures. AUSCERT takes no responsibility for the
consequences of applying the contents of this document.
If you believe that your system has been compromised, contact AUSCERT or
your representative in FIRST (Forum of Incident Response and Security
Teams).
AUSCERT is located at The University of Queensland within the Prentice
Centre. AUSCERT is a full member of the Forum of Incident Response and
Security Teams (FIRST).
AUSCERT maintains an anonymous FTP service which is found on:
ftp://ftp.auscert.org.au/pub/. This archive contains past SERT and AUSCERT
Advisories, and other computer security information.
AUSCERT also maintains a World Wide Web service which is found on:
http://www.auscert.org.au/.
Internet Email: auscert@auscert.org.au
Facsimile: (07) 3365 4477
Telephone: (07) 3365 4417 (International: +61 7 3365 4417)
AUSCERT personnel answer during Queensland business hours
which are GMT+10:00 (AEST).
On call after hours for emergencies.
Postal:
Australian Computer Emergency Response Team
Prentice Centre
The University of Queensland
Brisbane
Qld. 4072.
AUSTRALIA
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Revision History
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[ End AUSCERT Advisory ]
______________________________________________________________________________
CIAC wishes to acknowledge the contributions of AUSCERT 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: +1 510-422-8193
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 (198.128.39.53)
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. SPI-ANNOUNCE for official news about Security Profile Inspector
(SPI) software updates, new features, distribution and
availability;
3. SPI-NOTES, for discussion of problems and solutions regarding the
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Our mailing lists are managed by a public domain software package
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subscribe (add yourself) to one of our mailing lists, send the
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ciac-bulletin, spi-announce OR spi-notes for list-name:
E-mail to ciac-listproc@llnl.gov or majordomo@tholia.llnl.gov:
subscribe list-name
e.g., subscribe ciac-bulletins
You will receive an acknowledgment email immediately with a confirmation
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you are really the one who asked to be signed up for the list in question.
If you include the word 'help' in the body of an email to the above address,
it will also send back an information file on how to subscribe/unsubscribe,
get past issues of CIAC bulletins via email, etc.
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
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This document was prepared as an account of work sponsored by an
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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
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