First OpenOffice Virus, Not In the Wild 169
NZheretic writes "According to APCmag, the first cross-platform OpenOffice.org virus — 'SB/Badbunny-A' — was emailed directly to Sophos from the virus developers. The proof-of-concept virus affects Windows, Mac OS X, and Linux systems and uses different methods on each. It has not yet been seen in the wild. Despite Sun's OpenOffice.org developer Malte Timmermann's claims to the contrary, this kind of embedded scripting attack represents a real threat to OpenOffice.org users. Back in June 2000 when Sun first announced the open sourcing of OpenOffice.org, the twelfth email to the open discussion list put forward a two-part solution for providing OpenOffice users with Safe(r) Scripting using restricted-mode execution by default and access by signed digital certificates. In October 2000 the issue of treating security as an 'add-on' feature rather than as a 'system property' was again raised. Is it time to now introduce such measures to the OpenOffice.org Core to greatly reduce any future risk from scripted infections?"
The real solution (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:The real solution (Score:4, Informative)
Re:The real solution (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:The real solution (Score:5, Funny)
Re:The real solution - Replying to myself (Score:1)
I read this all the time. Don't go to untrustworthy websites.
What should one do? Should they run a whois on every site before going to it? Should they then run a background check on the site owner and the technical contact, if it's not bogus or private? What if it is? Then what does a person do?
People who go to warez sites or any movie/music download site they can find off a search engine deserve what befalls their computer - because one has to take risk f
Re: (Score:2, Funny)
- has content linked in (THAT would open a whole can of trust-this-trust-that now would it!)
- has bugs in web, app or db server.
- accepts malicious content including links to content
- you don't know if you can trust everyone with or who could get admin access to that server.
More or less. But it cant be that hard now can it, because I've heard of people making these decisions in realtime, while they surf.
Re:The real solution (Score:5, Funny)
Hmmm...this sounds familiar.
I think you just described Slashdot.
-- a really old
Re: (Score:2, Redundant)
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
Correction -- low 5-digits.
No not the account, I mean you
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Re: (Score:2)
(likewise with the new anti-phishing things in FF/IE7)
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2, Insightful)
Many people get viruses (appearing to come) from well known trusted sources, so this advice is wrong.
The correct thing to say is:
Don't open unsolicited attachments or files, ever .
If in doubt, speak to the sender and confirm its validity.
The real problem (Score:5, Funny)
Re: (Score:2, Interesting)
I have seen this happen with web pages and FireFox. People complain that FireFox does not work with several web pages, when in reality, those web pages (which are tailored for IE) do not work with FireFox.
etc.
Re:The real solution (Score:5, Insightful)
Most people don't work in financial companies (Score:3, Insightful)
You are correct that vulnerable functionality should be in a protected wrapper. However, this will simply reduce, not eliminate shenanigans. Clever monkeys will still find a way.
Not just finance companies - even departments (Score:4, Insightful)
Those departments don't always fancy calling the IT department when they have an IT requirement - particularly if it doesn't seem that complicated. There is always someone in the department who knows their way around Excel (and possibly Access) better than any of their colleagues. So they cobble something together in some 'orrible mess of VB macros linking who knows what files, referential integrity or scalable design be damned.
Were you to audit any sizeable business for spreadsheets made somehow interactive with scripts and badly designed databases thrown together in Access, I guarantee you'd be amazed and disturbed in equal measure. And you really don't want to start trying to figure out which ones have somehow become critical to the business.
This has been going on for years. Try taking that functionality away today, you might as well suggest replacing their computers with slide rules.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
And that, of course, is almost directly related to the fact that the MS file formats are closed. With an open format like ODF, scripts for importing data aren't critical, since it's quite easy instead for a program to export it in the proper format, or to write an external script or program to transform data into ODF format. After all, it's XML.
Unfortunately MS has trained industry to rely on scripting to
Re: (Score:2)
This is also the case with MS Office. Microsoft provides COM interfaces to the office products that can be used to generate documents. I do this all the time with Excel. It is actually very simple to use and well documented.
Re: (Score:2)
Yes, I know that STDIN can be one of the files, but that only works if the
Re: (Score:2)
And there's the problem right there. CSV can't contain tabs, formatting data, formulas etc, etc.
ODF is an open text-based format that any program capable of outputting ascii can create, and which can contain that metadata. You
Reckon you coul write a Perl script to output;
<formula="oooc:=SUM([.A2:.A4])" office:value-type="float"
Re: (Score:2)
I don't get why anyone (with the users interests at heart) would add office scripting functionality without adding some form of permissions. Maybe back in the days before networking it was practical because most files were created on the computer itself or came on a trusted disk.
It's not even an option to inspect macros on Office before opening the fil
Re: (Score:2)
The real problem - legacy code. (Score:2)
I am a developer, but the caveot is I don't know jack about the code and its current iteration. I could and may be way off base, but here goes anyway.
The only way you'll ever address it is to start. From scratch. Build the core of the program with security in mind. Converters have to pass through that core security layer. Add-ons n
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Re:OO already does that. (Score:5, Insightful)
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Clearly you've missed the whole point of UAC. It's designed to let you carry out an action that requires administrative rights, while running under a non-admin account. Ever see that KDE or GNOME root prompt when you open an admin tool? Same thing. If you're installing a driver, it's assumed you are already an administrator and generally know what you're doing, so there's no need for a prompt. If you're running in 32-bits, you get a warn
Re: (Score:2)
I can't think of a scenario where an app like an RSS reader would need admin-type access, so if possible I'd suggest you notify the creators and tell them it breaks in Vista.
What reader is this? Personally I use Google Reader so I'm not familiar with the desktop apps.
Re: (Score:2)
Seriously, I suggest you drop that app, and send an email to the publisher detailing why you did it. I dropped three or four apps myself when I moved to Vista. Either I can live with the hassle because
Re: (Score:2)
Installing applications? I don't need a warning when I'm installing an application. I know that I'm installing an application.
[...]
Oh, and by the way, have you ever heard of a malicious device driver?
How you never heard of a malicious program? Apparently not. Which is strange, because trust me, there are LOTS of them around in the Windows world. Yes, you know when you're installing an application -- that's the whole point! The prompt is asking you "Have you just double clicked on the installer of a program you wish to install, or have I just popped up seemingly for no reason whilst you were browsing dodgy websites?" If the former, then you click 'allow'; if the latter, you click 'cancel' and go to
Re: (Score:2)
Oh wow! A celebrity on Slashdot! Everyone say hello to Dilbert's boss!
"Oh, and by the way, have you ever heard of a malicious device driver?"
They're called rootkits, Jim. Maybe you've heard of them.
Somehow I have a feeling that the joke's gonna be on me: that this guy was just trying to see how dumb people would believe he is, and isn't really that stupid. At least that would prese
Re: (Score:2)
O RLY (Score:2)
And this is different from "M$" Office in what way?
Re: (Score:2)
No, the 'default' is to ask you what you want to do.
If you are running under an admin account, it's by choice. Office (and Windows) works perfectly well under non-admin accounts.
This is relevant because...?
Sure. If you're going to admit you're wrong then by all means. If you're going to keep doing the "well M$ is teh worse" logic, then no.
Why don't you just admit you're wrong? Is that so painful?
The backdoor from hell (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:The backdoor from hell (Score:5, Funny)
You just conceived it? Congratulations! Do you have a name picked out?
Re:The backdoor from hell (Score:5, Funny)
The "backdoor from hell" already has a name: hello.jpg.
saving Grandma from Linux .. (Score:2)
Re: (Score:1, Insightful)
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
IMO, all these people saying "Unix can't suffer from viruses therefore it's secure!" are living in a fools paradise where they don't appear to have realised that the "executable file infector which spreads when the infected file is executed"-type virus is all but dead, and most things described as viruses today would be more accurately described as trojans.
I don't think anything much will change
Virus Name (Score:3, Funny)
Re: (Score:2, Informative)
"The worm attempts to download and display an indecent JPEG image of a man wearing a bunny suit performing a sexual act in woodland."
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
-A = First variant. If someone modifies it to do something else, then you'll see -B, -C, etc.
Charles
Re: (Score:2)
Each AV company names things slightly differently, but the general method is:
TYPE/Common-VARIANT
Type can be "W32" or "TROJ" or "VB" or "SB", etc.
Common is a descriptive common name. In this case, the virus places a file called badbunny.js or badbunny.py and downloads a file called badbunny.jpg. Thus "badbunny" was chosen.
Variant is usually alphabetic, starting with A and going into double letters (AA, AB, etc.) if necessary.
How are racehorses named?
Re: (Score:2)
Documents shouldn't run code (Score:4, Insightful)
Imagine how few viruses and trojans there would be if requiring script was the exception rather than an unfortunate rule.
Oh well, we can all dream.
Re: (Score:2)
Running scripts should not be a binary issue. Scripts should always run, by default, in an appropriate security sandbox, and only get additional privileges through explicit user interaction or through some kind of trust mechanism.
Programs that load scripts from external sources should not be gaping security holes, just because I trust a program doesn't mean that my only choices with a script should be trust it as much as I trust the prog
Re: (Score:2)
There will always be a vendor like MS to make everything so much easier for us, without thinking about the consequences. It will happen on Linux too. Some would argue it already is (just compare most Linux distros to OpenBSD for example), just not nearly as bad as on the Windows platform.
Featuritis is an illness that is cross platform I'm afraid. Many small and efficient projects seem to be doomed to become bloatware, once they've become popular.
Re: (Score:2)
There will always be a vendor like MS to make everything so much easier for us, without thinking about the consequences. It will happen on Linux too.
Really, in this particular case, its an application issue not an OS issue, and its already happened with regard to plenty of Linux apps that support scripting.
Having a fairly secure OS doesn't you limited good if applications that run with reasonably broad permissions, for good reason, themselves serve as pla
Re: (Score:2)
You can't protect against gullible users. Any attempt at security that makes that a goal is just misgui
Re: (Score:2)
....except, of course, that PDFs are Turing-complete scripts that tend to make pretty pictures.
Why not use another alternative? (Score:1, Interesting)
Finally feature compatible with Office (Score:5, Funny)
:BEGIN HUMOR:
Well, finally OpenOffice has become a viable Office Suite, having finally added the most notable features of Office, namely script exploit capabilities. It's about time... now there is nothing keeping people from switching to OO!!!
:END HUMOR:
OpenOffice team: WHY?? Are you NUTS?? (Score:2)
What I want to do is figure out why OpenOffice is such a steaming pile of crap. Why would someone want such a slow, bloated program? Who decided it would be a good idea to turn on scripting by default? When are they going to make a decent user interface?[1] Well, I think I've figured out a few places where OOo is not like other open source software. Perhaps we could le
Re: (Score:2)
Yes, I think so too. (Well, Gnumeric [gnome.org] isn't officially part of Abiword, but you know what I mean --the default spreadsheet application on the Ubuntu GNOME desktop.) I use it despite having a KDE desktop.
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
Oooh... I wonder how that will work on Vista?
Vista: Open Office wants permission to generate a pop-up requesting approval to run a possibly malicious script... Cancel/Allow
...Allow
OO: OO needs permission to run a script... Cancel/Allow
...Allow
Vista: Open Office is trying to run a script... Cancel/Allow
...Allow
Vista: Steve Ballmer is about to throw a chair at you... Allow/Duck & Allow
So what's this virus going to do again??? (Score:4, Informative)
Is it going to infect other binaries in my system? No, they're only writeable by root.
Oh wait this is how it works:
"SB/BadBunny-A spreads by dropping malicious script files that affect the behavior of the popular IRC programs mIRC and X-Chat, causing them send SB/BadBunny-A to other users. These malicious script files are named badbunny.py (for XChat) and script.ini (for mIRC, overwriting the existing mIRC file) and are also detected as SB/BadBunny-A."
So.. this "virus" relies on some twisted assumption that I use XChat, to send itself to other people RUNNING XCHAT, NOT OPEN OFFICE?!?
So tell me again how this is a virus? If I email you a shell script named "Click me.sh" than runs "rm -Rf ~/", is that a virus too?
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Why not? Ostensibly, OO will run as user YOU, and YOU have access to your Tbird address book, and so would OO. Unless you're running SE Linux like a bat out of hell (most people don't) or have chroot or suid set up. Most *nix users however, don't have this kind of set up.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:1, Insightful)
because we all uninstall everything we don't use right? you fail to see that they can be written to use other apps, this just happens to use mirc or xchat.
never underestimate a determined thief.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
If the virus creator were especially vigilant then they could test for all sorts of installed applications with existing and exploitable/profitable data under ~/
Re: (Score:2)
You say it like there is something wrong with running SE Linux or that it will make your experience of Linux worse. I run it and I've only ever had one problem which we managed to diagnose and file a bugzilla report which got it fixed within 4 days... not bad really. I can honestly recommend it for everyone.
I do see the problem though which you mention, namely that you can still do enough damage whilst running as user - especially because it cou
Re: (Score:2)
yet another bogus Linux 'virus' story .. (Score:4, Informative)
"They are attacking the vulnerability of people's brains [guardian.co.uk] ", Graham Cluley, Sophos
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Getting write and execute permissions is a concern. Because they wider the Linux audience, the more people will want to double click on an attachment to see the 'dancing ponies' or whatever.
Sad, but true.
Re: (Score:1)
Not that I use ICQ/Other much anyway, as it tends to be a security hole.
And when I do use it, it's chrooted to a protected account anyway.
Feel free to infect my chrooted jail all you want. Really
That's the biggest issue that I think a lot of Linux advocates are saying is the big difference between Windows and Linux.
Both don't protect against absolute incompetence, but if you're going to be boned, get boned on Linux. Most people who
Re: (Score:1)
Have you ever taken a look at who you are talking about?
Why must Sun (Score:4, Insightful)
Copy even Microsoft's mistakes?
I mean, really. We've known about macro viruses for 20 years, and the danger of putting executable code in documents for about the same, and yet, in 2007, an open-source application, backed by a major UNIX vendor is released with this vulnerability?
Apparently many eyes do not make bugs shallow. I guess the community was asleep at the switch. Or maybe, something in the process is broken. Or maybe Sun just doesn't care.
Now, lest you think this a troll, consider: Security and virus immunity have been a big selling point for open source systems. Until now. Sun is a large player in the open source arena, and this makes everyone else - secure or not - look bad. Security was the major selling point for OO, and now that it's questionable, I'm not sure where Sun is going to go with this: they can't compete with Microsoft on features, OO is far from a universal standard (which means you're going to be plagued with interoperability issues), and OO's last major selling point is that it is free as in beer.
Re: (Score:2)
hello?
Re: (Score:2)
More features = more attack surface = lower security.
Running downloaded (generally untrusted) code = rich extensibility = bad security. After all, the code writer is doing what they want, not necesarily what you want.
T
Re: (Score:2)
If you RTFA it's not a self-propagating virus that doesn't require interaction or stupidity by the user. But then again, the general populus is stupid and clicks yes for everything.
It's a 'script' that does something bad, not a virus. It's not even close to a macro 'virus'. You could call it a trojan by a far call.
Re: (Score:2)
Most people don't consider security when they're thinking of writing a document. They think about how they format their documents, how people will read their documents, and how much that will cost them. Other than that, I think most people don't give a dam
Re:Why must Sun (Score:2)
Well, they DIDN'T.
The default behaviour of OpenOffice.org with a document containing macros is that the user has to explicitly allow them to run.
Re: (Score:2, Funny)
In the darkest nightmares of Linux geeks.... (Score:4, Funny)
(Cue screen of XRoach for no obvious reason)
(Images from DOOM, for the oblig. explosions and gratuitous violence)
(Typing on an XChat console, the first related scene so far but still stupid)
(Scene shifts to Sun Microsystems and then to the OpenOffice group - vaguely related, sort of)
(Switch to any old virus research lab, nobody can tell them apart)
(Switch to a movie certificate for Open Virus, the Movie, rated C++)
Trust (Score:4, Interesting)
Scripting is a very important part of Office productivity suites. This is not going to change. But what does have to change is the notion of "I'll just toss in a macro with my document/spreadsheet". In reality, macros can get so complex, especially with Microsoft Office's ability to set up references to COM libraries, anything but the simplest macros require careful distribution.
Documents and spreadsheets should not have macros. Ever. The Office vendors need to make it a lot easier to create macro files that are distributed differently than document files. If you have to send along macros to recalc/resort a spreadsheet or something, they should go in a different file. When you open the macro file, the Office app should state which macros that are being activated, and give you the option to use them temporarily or permanently, and by default do not allow them access to the file system unless you specify otherwise, etc. Enabling/disabling macros is not enough, there needs to be levels of trust.
Certificates are good things, especially if you are a company that uses macros a lot internally. But for an individual, getting a code signing certificate by a trusted authority is cost prohibitive and difficult. The Office macro engines simply need to do a better job of limiting the exposure to macro vulnerabilities and make it easier for Joe User to distribute macros in a "responsible" manner.
Re: (Score:2)
You CAN NOT have a "leaky" sandbox. (Score:3, Interesting)
In 1997 Microsoft introduced Active Desktp, which included a deliberately "leaky" sandbox... controls and scripts that were on pages considered "trusted" could get anything up to full local-user access. In addition, Microsoft responded to Word macro viruses NOT by restricting the scripting language in Word (as expected) but by putting in checks to disable the ability to even examine macros if a document seemed suspicious. And they still haven't learned their lesson.
What's worse, this practise is spreading. While nobody has extended this model nearly as far as Microsoft, Firefox XPI installation involves having a web page request installation of unrestricted macros, and Apple lets you run software installers automatically if the user has left "Open safe files after downloading" enabled.
This kind of thing HAS to stop.
If you design an "inherently safe" scripting language, on ethat does not provide any hooks from *within* the documentto even requests the ability to modify mor ethan the document itself, then any security holes are bugs and can be patched without inconveniencing users. More powerful tools should always be run or installed from outside the document, explicitly under user control, and preferably from a version of the application that doesn't include a mechanism to access remote documents and is not ever invoked from a browser or mail program... or any other application intended to work with untrusted documents.
This design, which used to be taken for granted (the idea of an email worm that could even potentially be run by just viewing an email message used to be a *joke*... everyone *knew* that nobody would be stupid enough to make the Good Times virus real) is not "clumsy" or "inconvenient". It's more convenient than the environment we're in now where applications are perpetually bringing up "Hey! I'm about to do someting stupid! You wanna let me?" dialogs that people reflexively swear at as they approve the stupid action.
We need to turn this around, folks. Bring back the sandbox, don't even include the commands to write files in the sandboxed versions of the macro interpreter, and stop turning the Internet into some kind of bad science fiction movie where the earthlings infect the alien computer from a Powerbook.
Re: (Score:2)
It's not really a problem. We know how to design inherently safe languages. We also know how to design interfaces by which users can running scripts in unsafe languages without allowing untrusted objects to run these scripts.
Scripting is only useful because it allows you to automate things that you do repetitively.
That's a little simplified, but basically true, and also irrelevant. First, a lot of repetitive tasks are things like filling out standard forms
virusscanner bloat (Score:3, Insightful)
meanwhile, our computers get slower and slower. virusscanners eat up lots of resources and become ever slower. I recently noticed clamav takes 13 seconds to scan an infected
wouldn't it be time that antivirus companies slim down the signature lists a bit. of course it is cute to boast a "number of signatures" above 100.000, but who is really getting benefit from the scanning of all those hypothetical viruses?
Well, they wanted Word functionality (Score:2)
Signed scripts? (Score:2)
Yeah, similarly on how signed extensions would make firefox safer??
I have yet to se 1 (ONE) signed firefox extension...
Distributed Trusted Repository (Score:2)
This kind of architecture is one way that Debian (and derivatives) is protected by A
Re: (Score:1)
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
I hope it's satire.
Is that in octadecimal? (Score:2)
Damn, that's a lot of patents.