p2pnet - rss feed: ‘Highly Critical’ Windows flaws
p2pnet.net News:- Secunia is still carrying warnings of serious, unpatched security holes in Microsoft Windows
In an alert issued on October 10 and updated on December 25, it warns of a “highly critical” flaw which can be exploited by malicious hackers to compromise a user’s system, conduct cross-site/zone scripting and bypass a security feature in Microsoft Windows XP SP2.
The firm details the dangers like this:
“1) Insufficient validation of drag and drop events from the “Internet” zone to local resources for valid images or media files with embedded HTML code. This can be exploited by e.g. a malicious web site to plant arbitrary HTML documents on a user’s system, which may allow execution of arbitrary script code in the “Local Computer” zone.
“This vulnerability is a variant of: SA12321
“NOTE: Microsoft Windows XP SP2 does not allow Active Scripting in the ‘Local Computer’ zone.
“2) A security site / zone restriction error, where an embedded HTML Help control on e.g. a malicious web site references a specially crafted index (.hhk) file, can execute local HTML documents or inject arbitrary script code in context of a previous loaded document using a malicious javascript URI handler.
“Successful exploitation may allow execution of arbitrary HTML and script code in a user’s browser session in context of arbitrary sites, or execution of local programs with parameters from the “Local Computer” zone using a HTML Help shortcut.
“NOTE: This will bypass the ‘Local Computer’ zone lockdown security feature in SP2.
“3) A security site / zone restriction error in the handling of the ‘Related Topics’ command in an embedded HTML Help control can be exploited by e.g. a malicious website to execute arbitrary script code in the context of arbitrary sites or zones.
“NOTE: This may be exploited to bypass the “Local Computer” zone lockdown security feature in SP2.
“Vulnerability 1 and 2, or 3 alone, in combination with an inappropriate behaviour where the ActiveX Data Object (ADO) model can write arbitrary files can be exploited to compromise a user’s system. This has been confirmed on a fully patched system with Internet Explorer 6.0 and Microsoft Windows XP SP2.”
Solutions?
Disable the “Drag and drop or copy and paste files” option; and, set the “Internet” zone security level to high, recommends Secunia.
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See:-
unpatched security holes - Microsoft Internet Explorer Multiple Vulnerabilities, Secunia, December 25, 2004
December 27th, 2004 at 9:24 pm
As long as people continue to use dodgy operating systems and software, problem are sure to arise. Use Linux and be free. If you are forced to use Windows because of some software or hardware that is not Linux compatable, complain loudly. Complaining works.
We as consumers have few rights or powers against the cartels (and their henchmen in government) as individuals, but we have great power over the cartels as a whole. It is time for those who havent done so to start making the switch. Those that don’t try deserve to get ripped off, virused, spied apon, and stolen from. We need to go back to the idea of helping each other and not expecting big government and the cartels to provide for our needs. This is what Linux is about, helping one another. It’s about innovation capitalism, and freedom. We in civilized society have lost the idea of freedom. We need to regain our freedom, and this can be done partly through using free software.
Use Linux and be free from spyware, vruses, DRM and other nonsense.
December 28th, 2004 at 1:29 am
I remember the brief 1 week window in which apple computers had a similar security hole.
They fixed it quietly within the same week.
Hard to believe nobody had exploited this in windows until now.
December 28th, 2004 at 8:46 am
Hi there, i have a major problem with my hotmail account, i cannot open it as it says my browser is not sufficient and to download internet explorer, i have uninstalled and reinstalled internet explorer, still with the same problem.
the error says,
internet explorer script error
line 16
char 1
error object expected
code 0
url http;//xtramsn.co.nz/home/o,,10849,00,html
also i cannot go to windows update, all i get are the letters
var cursite=3
i am on windows 98 se.
my email address is jocko228@yahoo.com.au, as i cannot access my jockomcguinn@hotmail.com account.
Thanks
Jock McGuinn
December 29th, 2004 at 7:55 pm
1. One major problem may be that you are still using Internet Exploder. Try Firefox http://www.mozilla.org
2. If you insist on using Internet Exploder, please tell me what version and what “security” setting you are using. Many site insist on using IE Version 6 or above.
3. You might try doing an Internet Exploder reapair.
4. You can do this by clicking on start, then settings, and then control panel. After opening control panel, click on Add/Remove programs, and choose Internet Explorer. Now choose repair Internet Explorer and follow the directions from there.
December 30th, 2004 at 7:24 am
I agree that Linux is a decent operating system, however, it’s a far cry from consumer friendly. You average computer user doesn’t know that a kernel is much less how to build one. GCC? They will look at you like you are crazy. The *nix operating systems are making efforts to be more user friendly, but the hard cold facts are that people don’t care how their operating system works. Just that it does. Using the latest cutting edge graphics card? Well, until somoene with enough programming knowledge comes along and writes a driver for it, you won’t be seeing too much in the POSIX enviroment. How about that new wireless NIC and router? Better have that wired 10/100 pci card handy. While it is doing a great job of supporting certain cards, it’s not supporting them all. Hardware developers make an assumption when writing drivers. “People are stupid. They all use windows.” Sure it’s not true for every company, but most of them design their hardware just for windows.
As for virii and linux: as of late, there has been a slowly increasing stream of viruses in the POSIX enviroment. And let’s not forget that these users with no previous knowledge of the operating system will assume that they are safe just by using the POSIX enviroment. They will make no efforts to avoid unauthorized access to their boxes. Someone with a little time on their hand could easily SSH into it and run whatever they like in the background and the user would be non the wiser.
Breaking it all down, it’s not the operating system you use. It’s the software you use within it and the knowledge of how that software works. This is where the POSIX enviroment is the better of the two. Most software is opensource and modification (with the correct C/C++/Assembly knowledge) is a snap. So if you really want security, it’s something you need to handle yourself.