Netgear's Amusing "fix" for WG602v1 Backdoor 515
An anonymous reader writes "Recently Slashdot reported that the Netgear router has as WLAN backdoor. According to this report by the news service of the German publisher Heise Netgear "fixed" the problem with a firmware update. And what is the fix? According to Heise, they didn't remove the backdoor at all. Instead they just changed the login information! They replaced the old user name 'super' with 'superman', and changed the old password to '21241036'. "
Oops... (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Oops... (Score:5, Informative)
Well, that might be good enough, if they could choose the login information. But now that they published it....
First rule of passwords is that you don't talk about your passwords....
Re:Oops... (Score:4, Funny)
Re:Oops... (Score:3, Funny)
Re:Oops... (Score:5, Funny)
I don't know, but I know Rule 8: If this is your first login, you have to change your password.
Re:Oops... (Score:5, Funny)
The second rule of passwords is that you do not talk about your passwords.
The third rule is if someone uses "password" or nothing, there is no password.
The fourth rule is only one person to a password.
The fifth rule is one password at a time.
The sixth rule is no sheets, no stickies.
The seventh rule is password will be expired when they have to
and the final rule of passwords is, if it's your first logon, you have to set one.
Re:Oops... (Score:5, Funny)
one password to find them,
one password to bring them all
and in the darkness bind them
oh wait... shouldn't people use more than one password?
Re:Oops... (Score:3, Interesting)
I would have swore the first two lines and the last line would have given it away tho.
Re:Oops... (Score:3, Funny)
In other news (Score:4, Funny)
I would say this qualifies more as ... (Score:5, Insightful)
But that's just me.
Re:Oops... (Score:5, Insightful)
Any open source coder would be summarily flogged for such a transgression. Why on EARTH is this not literally considered a criminal offense for a company to do?
And I for one used to hold Netgear in reasonably high regard, too.
Never again.
Re:Oops... (Score:5, Insightful)
The answer lies within the question: Because we pay them.
If someone paid you to paint a building and didn't care whether you stripped off the old paint first, I guarantee you you would just slap a coat over the old paint.
>And I for one used to hold Netgear in reasonably high regard, too.
Your mistake, then.
>Never again.
You should not say never if you want to reach them. This just makes the company execs think that since they can never reach you as a customer again, they won't make the effort. What you should say instead is: "I will purchase products from other companies since theirs do not address my needs at this time."
This is reasonable to them, and they won't discount you as a hot-head but rather may take your advice.
Just my
Re:Oops... (Score:5, Funny)
I feel better for that...
Re:Oops... (Score:5, Insightful)
The question of "why are companies allowed to get away with this crap" is a good one. They should either be forced to tell people what they're buying, or be accountable for the consequences of deception.
Re:Oops... (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Oops... (Score:5, Interesting)
In fact I drove all possible candidates for several days before I bought what I have now. It is quite easy. Every time you go on a holiday rent one of the candidates for "next thing to buy". You get to see it in all of its "glory" - lowest spec, run down by tourists and badly maintained. If it is still OK you go and buy it. You may suffer some minor discomfort compared to renting "the old familiar", but you save a lot of money
I also do the same stuff with computer equipment. Buy, test drive if it is shit - return. It is quite easy to do it in EU due to distance selling regulations. You are entitled to a free return no questions asked of anything you have bought over phone or Internet within 1 week after purchase. This limits you to internt purchases, but once you add this along with observations of company kit you are reasonably well positioned to get the right stuff...
Re:Oops... (Score:4, Interesting)
We then rented the car we ultimately bought, and it's been so good to us, she's still got the first one, I bought a second one, and I have since traded it in for a high-performance version of the same. Whee!
And no, I'm not going to tell you the cars, but I'll give you a hint: the one we hated rhymes with bored locus, and the one we love (sort of) rhymes with grease-on ben-tra. Hard to rhyme with car names that are invented words. Heh.
Grumpy old man (offtopic) (Score:4, Funny)
Hope you like it. Have fun with your car!
(note: it was an '86. I've heard they have gotten better.)
Re:Oops... (Score:5, Insightful)
If anyone has been damaged by the availability of the back door they should be held liable even if they claim you waive that right in their license agreement (their license agreement does not state there may be the possibility of back doors, no?)
If you claim something is secure, but that you can't prevent all future attacks so you can't be liable, that's one thing, but when the liability is clearly your fault, it's another.
Re:Bad Idea (Score:3, Insightful)
It's not some logic flaw someone found, like a buffer overflow (which no one would blame them for), it's something extra they put into their product specifically making it insecure.
If a car company finds a flaw in it's airbag system, they replace the airbags and no one blames them - they fixed the problem they saw. If they specifically used flawed airbags, it's entirely different matter. I know
Re:Bad Idea (Score:5, Funny)
"Oh, the white airbags don't work? Here, let me paint it blue."
Re:Oops... (Score:5, Funny)
Face it, until there is a major disaster involving IT security most of this type of information will remain the exclusive domain of security geeks and haxors.
Re:Oops... (Score:3, Interesting)
When I go down to the military surplus store, I can refuse to buy clothing wrapped in boxes and bags, because I don't get to see them. Instead, I go to the shelves and take a good look at what's on th
Re:Oops... (Score:3, Insightful)
-Jesse
Re:Oops... (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Oops... (Score:5, Interesting)
IANAL, but I seem to recall a lawyer I know telling me that with product liability, a company is liable if due diligence is not performed to fix an issue when a known problem exists. Of course, the trick becomes can you call changing a username and password due diligence? I feel certain every computer expert in the world would say no.
Re:Oops... (Score:3, Insightful)
Normally you'd find them liable if they showed negligence, but in this case they themselves proactively introduced the security risk. It's worse then merely being negligent.
Re:No harm, no foul (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Oops... (Score:4, Interesting)
Silly programmer, backdoors are for script kiddies.
-Adam
Re:Oops... (Score:5, Interesting)
Just how many criminal laws do you think we need? Seriously. Do you think we need another one?
There's no doubt in my mind that the vendor would be held liable for damages if anybody were harmed--financially I mean--by this kind of thing. But should somebody really go to jail over it?
Geez. And I thought I was a fascist.
Re:Oops... (Score:4, Informative)
I don't see how forcing a company to take a defective product back and returning the purchasers money is "wildy disproportionate." It's seems exactly proportionate, no more, no less.
If I sold computers that didn't work as advertised, and the consumer was out $200 for it, then giving them a coupon for $5 off their next purchase is hardly compensatory. Compensatory... I need to compensate them. They spent $200 for a product that did not work as advertised...
Re:Oops... (Score:5, Insightful)
You answered your own question. If everyone who owns one of these took it back and demanded their money back because it is not suitable for the purpose for which it was sold, they'd soon get the message.
Why on EARTH is this not literally considered a criminal offense for a company to do?
Because the civil courts are there to cope with this kind of thing?
Re:Oops... (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Oops... (Score:4, Funny)
Last time I checked it, was a flag that sort of looked like a window...
Re:Oops... (Score:5, Funny)
"What da ya mean? It's MUCH more secure than it was before."
Doh.
Re:Oops... (Score:5, Funny)
According to Netgear... (Score:4, Informative)
Re:According to Netgear... (Score:5, Informative)
Nice fix. (Score:5, Funny)
I wonder... (Score:5, Funny)
I jest of course.
Re:I wonder... (Score:5, Funny)
Login: Theyllneverguess
Password: cuzimso1337
Re:I wonder... (Score:3, Funny)
+1 INFORMATIVE!!
Superman!! (Score:5, Funny)
Not funny at all (Score:5, Interesting)
I think it's time the government steped in to protect the consumer and started making companies liable for acts as stupid as this. This just isn't the way a responsible company behaves.
Simon.
Re:Not funny at all (Score:5, Funny)
responsible company
Trying to put these two words together is like trying to touch two magnet ends with the same polarity.
Re:Not funny at all (Score:5, Insightful)
No, there aren't many responsible companies at all, and your post illustrates why. They have higher prices, less effective marketing (because they don't lie like their irresponsible competition), don't get ahead because they don't do unethical backroom deals, etc., so in the end they just go belly-up, and all the irresponsible companies get bigger.
Re:Not funny at all (Score:3, Insightful)
EULAs cannot prevent lawsuits. The EULA becomes part of the evidence of the suit and the suit itself determines to what degree, if any, its terms effect a possible ruling.
In fact, this is precisely how the legality of a EULA is tested. A EULA is a just a contract. Contracts don't prevent lawsuits, they become the object of them.
KFG
Re:Not funny at all (Score:3, Informative)
Strictly speaking, it's a licence. It's different. It gives you permission to do certain things with it assuming certain limitiations. e.g. You may use this product for reasons X and Y but not Z. As a licence, it cannot require the licencee to give up anything in return.
Where is the outrage? (Score:3, Insightful)
I mean, I can turn on my nightly news and hear about "getting ripped off at the dry cleaners? Let our investigative unit show you how!" but when your personal home network with all your work, personal stuff, family photos, etc are now open to the world because of some backdoor its like its no big deal.
It seems like until someone writes a worm to really screw these people over, no one is going to care. And I'm
Re:Not funny at all (Score:5, Informative)
Jeroen
Now you did it! (Score:5, Funny)
And thanks to Slashdot, thus begins an endless stream of firmware updates; every time Netgear "fixes" their problem, I'm sure an article here will put the cycle in motion again. Let's see, who wants to guess what they change the password to next?
"superduperman", anyone?
Bianry Edit (Score:5, Interesting)
I've done it with other types of binary files, but never tried with firmware.
Anyone try this?
Re:Bianry Edit (Score:4, Informative)
I'd imagine it wouldn't work. They've probably checksummed the file, and if you change any of the content you'd have to rechecksum it, if you even knew what kind of checksum (if any) they'd used.
Nice idea though.
Re:Bianry Edit (Score:5, Interesting)
However, it was possible to edit the firmware in a binary editor. There was a checksum in the firmware, but you could fix it. You needed to connect a serial cable to the management port. When you made a change and uploaded the new firmware to the router and rebooted, the router would helpfully tell you what the old checksum was and what it expected the new checksum to be. You could then just search for the old checksum string and replace it with the new one the router calculated for you.
Pretty easy to do. And allowed you to run some of the newer Zytel firmware on the Netgear boxes.
Re:Bianry[sic] Edit (Score:3, Interesting)
Reputation damage (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:Reputation damage (Score:4, Insightful)
From other postings, it appears that until this, technically they appear to produce good equipment. However, undocumented "features"
Those of us that regularly read Slashdot are probably the alpha geeks of our groups. The person that many people come to for informal IT support at home and at work. I am frequently asked my opinion about gear and for recommendations on what gear to buy. These people then tell their friends what they use, why they use it and how satisfied they are. This "viral" type of advertising is the kind that you can't buy when it's good and can't kill when it's not. I will not recommend products by a company that, when caught with it's hand in the cookie jar, merely switches hands. It was bad enough to get caught doing this but to change the password rather than remove the exploit reveals a mindset that I will keep in mind during future work in this field.
Can they recover from this? I would imagine that there are ways to do so aside from the usual corporate tactic of relying on consumer apathy and time. I'll be curious to see if they bother and what they do if they do bother to try.
Very sad (Score:5, Insightful)
Since these things have built in firewalls, wouldnt the fix just include a user-invisible firewall rule preventing access to the router on whatever the admin port is (80, 8080, etc..)? Seems like a fairly simple fix to me.
Thanks Netgear! You've just assured that I'll never buy one of your products!
Link on securityfocus (Score:3, Insightful)
full-disclosure hackers knew for a while (Score:5, Interesting)
http://lists.netsys.com/mailman/listinfo/full-d
knew about this on irc for a while.
EU via interpol desires, and us's NSA/NRO both desire various entrypoints.
cisco's fiascos may be a trend. This netgear is only the tip of the iceberg I bet.
Who reads slashdot? (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Fixed in new firmware, available here: (Score:3, Informative)
by Chucky B. Bear (785810) on Saturday June 05, @03:10PM (#9345433)
I've just upgraded to the latest firmware. It is NOT FIXED!!!! They have simply gone and changed the username and password to something else. There is STILL a default superuser account with password.
(You can find it yourselve by just taking similiar steps as in the securityfoces article.)
Maybe reading slashdot sometimes would be a good idea.
Re:Who reads slashdot? (Score:5, Interesting)
I did talk to a netgear support engineer yesterday and he didn't know what I was talking about, so now I'm still waiting to hear anything back from them.
Supermaning it.... (Score:5, Interesting)
21241036 - For Backdoor Network Access, Call Jenny (Score:5, Funny)
Sound familiar? (Score:4, Interesting)
Not the first boner NetGear's pulled (Score:5, Informative)
http://www.cs.wisc.edu/~plonka/netgear-sntp/ [wisc.edu]
Abstract:
"In May 2003, the University of Wisconsin - Madison found that it was the recipient of a continuous large scale flood of inbound Internet traffic destined for one of the campus' public Network Time Protocol (NTP) servers. The flood traffic rate was hundreds-of-thousands of packets-per-second, and hundreds of megabits-per-second.
Subsequently, we have determined the sources of this flooding to be literally hundreds of thousands of real Internet hosts throughout the world. However, rather than having originated as a malicious distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attack, the root cause is actually a serious flaw in the design of hundreds of thousands of one vendor's low-cost Internet products targeted for residential use. The unexpected behavior of these products presents a significant operational problem for UW-Madison for years to come.
This document includes the initial public disclosure of details of these products' serious design flaw. Furthermore, it discusses our ongoing, multifaceted approach toward the solution which involves the University, the products' manufacturer, the relevant Internet standards (RFCs), and the public Internet service and user communities."
learned their security strategy from microsoft (Score:3, Interesting)
What really happened.. (Score:3, Funny)
Sad, but true
(or not)
Here's why they didn't remove it (Score:5, Insightful)
Well, it seems pretty obvious to me... it's supposed to be there.
This shows that it was Netgear's intention to purposely put back doors into the product. The reason "why" is not really evident. I can leave that up to the tinfoil hat crowd.
Secure Backdoors (Score:4, Interesting)
What I want to know is, why bother with user names and passwords in the backdoor? An SSH tunnel using only public key authentication would pretty much solve the problem of someone examining the firmware for the login information. You could also include multiple keys and provide a public key revokation server that the units automatically update from, as well as a general key update server that the units will grab new keys from using a callback mechanism (to guarantee that the key update servers have a valid private key for connecting to the unit).
blimey (Score:5, Insightful)
Change the fix to something else! (Score:5, Interesting)
Is there a checksum or CRC check in the firmware loader on the router that keeps you from being able to do that?
Re:Change the fix to something else! (Score:4, Informative)
Almost certainly. Vendors normally checksum firmware to avoid the possibility of flashing the hardware with corrupt firmware data. However, given Netgear's track record, you could probably flash it with a JPEG file and it'd accept it OK.
This sort of thing makes me wonder what backdoors are in other firmware and software that have not yet been discovered. I'm glad that there are people like SecurityFocus looking out for these exploits. Endless numbers of ADSL modems, routers and other equipment seem to have backdoors in them. I'm glad I route my ADSL through a switch and Slackware
Press release like in the dot-com boom... (Score:3, Funny)
The technology, which allows anyone to access enterprise networks when they enter 'superman' for the username and and '21241036' for the password, frees enterprises from worrying about security issues and allows IT managers to focus on implementing talking paperclips on enterprise desktops. "We are excited about the new technology," commented Steve Hjarkblonka in an interview. "For the first time since the invention of computers, the threat of security intrusions has been completely eliminated. Enterprises can now enjoy 100% unbreakable security."
Geoff Nikreny, chief security officer with Endostar Inc, calls the secure-by-default approach, in which once-vulnerable features are patched, a "mistake" that will lead to deployment confusion. But he doesn't know what he's talking about anyway. So for 100% unbreakable security, buy Netgear.
Offer good while supplies last.
Outsourcing security from a net security product? (Score:4, Insightful)
Nothing like trusting your future to some shady fly-by-night low-bidder who's not an employee. Whoever at Netgear argued this process saves money, I almost pity you. Almost.
Although in this case, you can't argue that specs called FOR a backdoor... but maybe there were no specs at all.
I don't blame them for this "quick fix".. as a longtime Software QA engineer I can tell you it takes more than 1 day to test something, unless you're willing to accept the risk that the fix could be worse. I'm willing to bet the OEM developer is probably just a one or two man shop, has no QA and might not even have source code control.
off-topic:
I run m0n0wall [m0n0.ch], a BSD distribution just for firewalls & routers. It doesn't need a hard drive so it's quiet.
I even yanked the CPU fan off the AMD K6/450 it is running on. CAUTION: passive cooling a CPU risks burning out the processor. To prevent this I fitted a stock AMD CPU sink from an Athlon 1800, and made a small duct for the power supply to draw air over the CPU (this was an OLD old ATX case with the PS directly above the CPU so it was easy).
Works great!
Too bad you can't upload monowall into consumer routers. I think this is the next step. Some vendor will start making it very easy to do such a thing (discoveries like the Linksys WRT54G hacking do not count).
Anyone seen this in the GPL listings of the code? (Score:3, Interesting)
Has anyone seen where the backdoor is coded into the system? (Hint: if it's NOT in the source anywhere, Netgear is violating GPL here).
Has anyone looked at the website? (Score:5, Informative)
http://kbserver.netgear.com/kb_web_files/n101383.
Now, there is a firmware from the 4th:
http://kbserver.netgear.com/support_details.asp?d
that claims to fix the problem, but I'm tempted to suggest what's happened is they've changed the username and password while they test a full fix. After all, changing data is generally less likely to break stuff than changing code...
FVS318 (Score:3, Interesting)
I like it. It's a very solid, reliable firewall/router. I've had it for a number of years now, and Netgear to this day continues to put out new firmware updates that not only fix bugs, but implement new features. It works well, and I always liked it better than my friend's Linksys.
But this whole crisis makes me really really leary... How do I know there isn't a backdoor in my firewall/router as well? The fact is, now I don't.
Getting a Linksys that can run a custom Linux distribution becomes more appealing every single day. This may be what finally pushes me over the edge.
Bryan
Foucault’s Pendulum (Score:3, Funny)
Allied Telesyn is the same way (Score:3, Interesting)
It's documented on their website that they do have a backdoor password, and what you need to do to get it. For me, it took a single email (ebay end of auction), and a 5 minute phone call to get the backdoor.
This would be fine, if the backdoor only worked on the serial console, but nope.. Works fine with the web interface too
In other news (Score:4, Funny)
Two words: "gross negligence" (Score:4, Interesting)
Wonder what DC has to say... (Score:3, Funny)
I wonder what DC Comics (and the other owners? [superman.ws]) have to say [dccomics.com] about NetGear using their copyrighted character in a commercial product ?
Why isn't this ilegal. (Score:5, Interesting)
Hm (Score:4, Interesting)
Maybe somebody could make a program where:
- User opens program
- User points program to firmware file
- Program opens firmware file and replaces the hardcoded passwords with gobbleygook that is different each time the program is run
- Program writes new firmware to disk
- User reflashes router with firmware patched by program
This seems like a good potential short-term solution to me...Google's translation is a little clearer (Score:3, Informative)
Netgear reacted to the messages over a Backdoor in the wl to ACCESS POINT WG602 Version1 promptly with a firmware update, however the Backdoor is still present -- this time only with new user name and password. With the name one was a little creative and extended the original character string "super" too "superman". With the password Netgear obviously took forum contributions for the first message of the safety gap seriously and changed the number on 2124103
Article Text (Score:5, Informative)
Netgear has promptly reacted to the reports of a backdoor in the WLAN-Access-Point WG602 Version 1 with a Firmware-Update, however, the backdoor is still present, but with a new user name and password. They were a little creative with the name and extended the original character string "super" to "superman." With the password, Netgear has obviously taken the message of security seriously and changed the password to "21241036." However, to whom this telephone number points, Netgear did not comment. There, they knew nothing and initially only wanted to make themselves aware of the (details of the) problem.
Again, there is not a real updated firmware design yet. The question arises whether users are still determined--after the second patch--to get new software. In the lawyer's opinions, this problem could be reason enough to take back the device to the retailer and receive a refund of the purchase price. For now, the retailer can try to fix the shortcoming, however, the chances of that are not very good.
Re:A joke surely? (Score:5, Insightful)
Unfortunately Heise (publisher of c't and iX) is the probably most clueful German publishing house when it comes to technology.
Those Netgear bozos really seem to be dumber then my cigar cutter.
The other explanation is that the equipment has such a fundamental design flaw that it can't be fixed at all. But then they act damn unresponsible.
Then again: Thanks to such blunders I know what equipment not to buy.
Re:A joke surely? (Score:5, Insightful)
The fundamental problem here is that we're running out of vendors! Linksys [slashdot.org] and Belkin [slashdot.org] are on the shitlist; now NetGear. Who, exactly, does that leave for consumer-grade networking equipment? I don't know about where you live, but where I live, these are about the only three vendors that show up on the computer store shelves (well, there are some cheapo brands, but they suffer even worse quality control problems).
Re:A joke surely? (Score:3, Informative)
Apple? [apple.com]
Re:A joke surely? (Score:3, Informative)
Re:A joke surely? (Score:4, Informative)
Re:At least ... (Score:5, Funny)
Re:anon to not karma whore (Score:3, Funny)
Oh, what exactly are we talking about again?
Re:Calm down... (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Firmware 1.5.67 doesn't take this password... (Score:4, Informative)
As a matter of fact it was me who found the 1.7.14 username and password and posted it to securityfocus after updating my firmware from 1.5.67(which I tested with the super username and password) to 1.7.14.
Re:Are there others? (Score:3, Interesting)
Getting off topic here but the main advantage of full disclosure with bugs and similar issues like this is you have the ability to verify and test for yourself. Sure beats getting an email that a patch is available and you have no idea what it fixed or how it fixed
Re:Why post this? (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:BULLSHIT (Score:3, Insightful)