home *** CD-ROM | disk | FTP | other *** search
-
- I just discovered that I can gain access to any IRIX 6.3 (and probably 6.4)
- machine by making a cgi script emulating the .tdf files in /usr/sysadm.
- The principle is simple - you make the cgi script use a mime type
- similar to an .edf or .tdf file (application/x-sgi-exec or
- application/x-sgi-task), and make the file name contain spaces and
- look quite similar to SaAddUserTask.tdf (or even SaModifyMyPassword.tdf),
- with the only difference being it containing the arguments too.
- If writing a cgi script to do this is too awkward, you can do this hack
- by simply installing a different web server than Netscape and modify
- the file type. Apache works fine. Basically, you make the server
- give one of the application types described above, and instruct it
- to execute one of the *legal* commands in /usr/sysadm when someone
- connects, with arguments enough to make it lethal. Then make a link
- to it (with the spaces in the link - %20 is a space in HTML) from
- another page. Then you just wait for someone with an SGI to access that
- file. Now, what I ask myself is:
- Is that *huge* security hole, which is much like ActiveX a deliberate
- thing from SGI, or didn't the people who made it know that SGI users
- could access web pages beyond the local trusted LAN?
- Was /usr/sysadm/* made by the same people who made the
- (now thankfully obsolete) objectserver?
-
- To everyone with IRIX 6.3+: To feel a BIT safer, open the "General
- Preferences" in Netscape, and change the actions for "x-sgi-task" and
- "x-sgi-exec" to "Unknown - prompt user".
- This means you won't be able to use some of the sysadm pages on the
- server at port 2077, but that's no big worry. You can do everything
- from root anyhow, and the 2077 server is by default running with access
- allowed from the whole world with root access, so it's a security bug
- in itself. So call do the above mods (preferably to the file
- /usr/local/lib/netscape/mailcap as well), then "chkconfig webface off",
- and even better, "chkconfig privileges off", and then call SGI and tell
- them what you think about their Mickey Mouse attitude towards security.
-
- (It took me almost 40 minutes to hack root with a .tdf file. I'm thick,
- so it took me a while to figure out how. I'm sure someone else can do
- better. To my knowledge, it does work for ANY 6.3+ client with a
- privileged user accessing a remote web page set up for hacking SGI's.)
-
- I *do* hope that SGI takes this seriously, and issues a warning that
- people who are accessing the internet (or anything outside the trusted
- LAN) should NOT run webface or privileges. Even if it means losing
- face for some SGI developers.
-
-
- Regards,
- --
- Arthur Hagen
- art@broomstick.com
-
- ========================================================================
-
-
- Furthermore on the html/privileges exploit:
-
- Because I think it unlikely there will be a fix to this any time soon,
- it would help if people running proxy servers set the servers up to
- filter these MIME types:
-
- application/x-sgi-exec exts=edf
- application/x-sgi-task exts=tdf
-
- and it probably wouldn't hurt to block the other application/x-sgi-
- mime types too:
-
- type=application/x-sgi-catalog exts=cdf
- type=application/x-sgi-glossary exts=gloss
- type=application/x-sgi-lpr exts=sgi-lpr
-