MS Mulling Changes to Thwart .ANI-type Attacks 99
Scada Moosh writes "ZDNet has a story about the lessons Microsoft learned from the recent animated cursor (.ani) attacks and some of the broad changes being made to flag this type of vulnerability ahead of time. The changes include a possible addition to the list of banned API function calls, more aggressive checks for buffer overruns and enhancements to existing fuzz testing tools. '[Michael] Howard said Microsoft will "rethink the heuristics" used by the /GS compiler to flag certain issues. "Changing the compiler is a long-term task. In the short-term, we have a new compiler pragma that forces the compiler to be much more aggressive, and we will start using this pragma on new code," he added. Two other Windows Vista security mechanisms -- ASLR and SafeSEH -- were also in place to catch code failures but, in the case of the .ani bug, Howard said the attackers were able to wrap vulnerable code in an exception handler to find ways around those mitigations.'"
Default deny policy (Score:3, Insightful)
While risking being out of sync with Slashdot's schizophrenic stance on Microsoft-bashing, let me lower my hammer on this one:
"The changes include a possible addition to the list of banned API function calls"
That's exactly the problem with security under Windows! (okay, there are other problems as well)
Microsoft needs to apply a "default deny" policy to all aspects of Windows' security and this sort of thing wouldn't be a problem in the first place. There shouldn't be a list of BANNED calls, there should be a list of safe ALLOWED calls.
I'm not saying that other operating systems couldn't do a better job too, but security is one (huge) area where Microsoft really and truly sucks - and it isn't something they can solve overnight, either. It seems ingrained in their philosophy and permeates all aspects of Windows (and other products).
Incremental approach. (Score:4, Insightful)
This incremental approach will eventually result in operating systems that are secure to all but the most sophisticated local attacks. You can't stop the attack where someone just downloads something and blindly runs it. Unlike most people, I don't think computer OS's and apps will always be as insecure as they have been for the last 15 years since the explosion of the Internet to the masses.
It may take another 5 years, but I think we're getting there. Vista isn't perfect, but it's a step closer.
For starters.... (Score:3, Insightful)
What Microsoft REALLY Needs To Do... (Score:3, Insightful)
Microsoft made a big to-do about "focusing on security" in the development of Windows Vista, but instead spent all this time A) spackling over the screwball security holes that the superfluous bits of the last version of the operating system created, and B) bolting on more superfluous bullshit.
The pattern of flagrant Windows/Microsoft security breaches has traditionally involved the fracal-like fuzz of superfluous features surrounding Windows. It simply tries to be too much. How many times have we heard about some hole in Internet Explorer that lets l33t h4xx0rs walk in and screw with your OS? Animated cursors opening security holes. ET-phone-home Windows Media player opening security holes. IIS subsystems on home user's computers opening security holes... Ad infinitum.
You want a web browser on your PC? Install a web browser. It shouldn't be your OS'es job. You want animated cursors? Install a cursor manager. It shouldn't be the OS'es job. You want media players? Install a media player. It shouldn't be the OS'es job. Are we seeing the fucking pattern here, yet? If Microsoft could focus on the core of the operating system, making it the platform and the framework that the rest of your computing experience happens on instead of trying to make it the damn "multimedia/computing experience" itself I'll wager a significant portion of these stupid, smack-on-the-forehead sort of problems would go away. And if and when they did crop up, users affected could just patch or uninstall the affected browser/media player/cursor manager/whatever instead of having it permanently tied into their OS for the rest of time (heaven forbid, for example, users reinstalling Windows into it's stock, unpatched state).
Innaccurate Summary (Score:3, Insightful)
Howard said that the vulnerable code happened to be wrapped in a very general try/catch block.
This try/catch block, which was in the vulnerable code already, and not injected by the attackers, potentially allowed the attackers to repeatedly try different memory locations looking for system call addresses that were randomized by ASLR.
Without this try/catch, the process would have crashed after the first failed attempt.
In other words, liberal try/catch policies can potentially expose security vulnerabilities by giving bad guys more than one chance to do their bad deeds.
Also, there were no reported instances of Vista being compromised. It is doubtful that the engineers of the various exploits targeted Vista, and therefor didn't take advantage of the try/catch issue to overcome ASLR since XP doesn't have ASLR. In addition, Protected Mode IE would have thwarted the attack even if they had.
Re:When have they stopped saying that kind of thin (Score:3, Insightful)
NT 3.0 was written from scratch. Please provide proof to the contrary, if you have it. Then, provide proof that *Microsoft* has claimed Vista is rewritten from scratch. And I said Vista, not Longhorn or anything else.
I'd calculate that about the same number of times you've declared "M$ Winblows" was "dead".
But I could be wrong.
Please provide proof of this. If true, it means that Microsoft has subverted the WP editorial controls, because for a closely-watched topic like that one, no matter how many times you edit it, someone will put your changes under the microscope. The vast majority of the Microsoft articles on WP are closely watched and by definition maintained free of harmful edits.
So, let's see some proof of your claim.