Check or Attack Name: Websendmail

The websendmail program allows a remote attacker to execute arbitrary commands on vulnerable systems. Websendmail is a cgi-bin program that comes with the WEBgais package. WEBgais is a collection of CGI gateway programs, which incorporate the Global Area Intelligent Search (GAIS) index/query system so that it can be used as a search engine in WWW information servers. Websendmail reads input from a form and sends e-mail to the specified destination. Versions of WEBgais up to v1.0b2 are vulnerable.

Temporary Fix: As root on the vulnerable machine, type: # /bin/chmod 400 /usr/local/etc/httpd/cgi-bin/websendmail (replace with your cgi-bin directory as appropriate).

Patches: No patches are available as of December 1998. You should disable websendmail with the temporary fix.

BUGTRAQ Mailing List, Vulnerability in websendmail, http://www.securityfocus.com/templates/archive.pike?list=1&msg=Pine.LNX.3.95.970704113121.1475A-100000@pop3.kappa.ro