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Crack Windows XP With... Windows 2000
An anonymous reader writes "According to this story seen on Brian's Buzz on Windows, access to a Windows 2000 CD is all that is needed to bypass all (well, most) Windows XP security features. An attacker can boot up XP and start the Windows 2000 Recovery Console which allows them to operate as any user, even Administrator, without requiring them to enter a password. This method even allows someone to copy files to removable media, something which normally the Administrator can't even do in the Recovery Console."
"Update: Some posters in the discussion thread point out this report may not be valid. One said that booting from a 2K CD did ask them for an administrator password and didnt let them in without it. Unfortunately, I dont have XP installed here to test it out before I posted."
Either way I don't find this to be terribly upsetting because a) root access can be gained in a similar manner with Linux and b) if one is worried about security, they shouldn't being using Windows to begin with.
This sounds particularly bad, as I'm assuming that it allows you to get by the NTFS filesystem-level encryption. This feature is *supposed* to allow you to encrypt files, and make it impossible for others to decrypt, even if they steal your drive, reinstall Windows on it, etc.
If you can just get Administrator access without reinstalling the OS (and killing the old UID tables), then this data suddenly becomes vulnurable!
An attacker can boot up XP and start the Windows 2000 Recovery Console which allows them to operate as any user, even Administrator, without requiring them to enter a password.
Speaking from experience, the win2k recovery console makes you enter the admin password before it will let you do anything, unless they are using some version of the recovery console other than the one that comes with windows 2000 professional.
Why not just use one of *several* NT password recovery disks? They work on XP, as well. I've used this one to bust into several Win2k Pro machines we'd forgotten the password for.
- A.P.
"Remember when the U.S. had a drug problem, and then we declared a War On Drugs, and now you can't buy drugs anymore?"
Take these precautions and you can be fairly secure with physical access. Add an encrypted file system so that if someone steals your hard disk you are safe. Then padlock the PC.
Those are reasonable steps for a Linux machine (and I may have missed some, please let me know if i did). Now with a windows xp machine it looks like you also need to disable cdrom access. An unreasonable step.
But am I misunderstanding this? Does this mean that there is a way for programs to be made to bypass Administrator password? If so why would this be limited to a windows 2000 disk? What's stopping someone from making a program that enters into Recovery Console, removing the need to be physically present or have a windows 2000 CD. Unless you actually have to boot from CD, but the article makes it sound like you can use the CD after the PC boots.
I booted Knoppix. It saw the NTFS partitions fine. The disks appeared on the Knoppix desktop. I opened an FTP connection to another machine, copied off the important files, and was done.
I will ALWAYS have a copy of Knoppix around.
I'm Rick James with mod points biatch!
Have you -read- the DMCA? Do you think the primary purpose of Windows 2000 was to be a circumvention device of Windows XP (which wasn't even released yet?)
(2) No person shall manufacture, import, offer to the public, provide, or otherwise traffic in any technology, product, service, device, component, or part thereof, that--
`(A) is primarily designed or produced for the purpose of circumventing a technological measure that effectively controls access to a work protected under this title;
`(B) has only limited commercially significant purpose or use other than to circumvent a technological measure that effectively controls access to a work protected under this title; or
`(C) is marketed by that person or another acting in concert with that person with that person's knowledge for use in circumventing a technological measure that effectively controls access to a work protected under this title.
Tried it this afternoon on one of my 2000 Servers and an XP Pro disc. I was greeted by a password prompt.
The default local security policy on every XP box I have access to seems to require authentication, but at the same time, more than half of the XP boxes I have access to also have an admin-level account that does NOT have a password on it, at all.
-- I wanna decide who lives and who dies - Crow T. Robot, MST3K
NO!
You can launch the Recovery Console from CD (or hard drive -- hell, I have it installed on all my machines (winnt32
If you're stupid enough to leave the Administrator password blank on your box, then yes, you can just press Enter at the prompt and you're in -- however copying to a floppy, and access to directories Administrator doesn't have rights to access, are DISABLED by default unless you enable "Recovery Console: Allow floppy copy and access to all drives and all folders" (Control Panel > Administrative Tools > Local Security Policy > Local Policies > Security Options). Note this doesn't remove the login requirement -- it only adds more access once you've logged into the Recovery Console.
It's a moot point anyway -- even if you have the Welcome Screen enabled (where Administrator doesn't appear unless there are no other accounts defined), you can just hit Ctrl+Alt+Del twice to blow right past the Welcome Screen and pop up the normal GINA logon dialog, where you can log on as Administrator (or whoever), and whatever password (or blank, if you don't specify one during installation -- thank God Windows Server 2003 warns against an insecure Administrator password during Setup).
...
Okay, I've somewhat calmed down now.
Even though I'll bet 75% of posts to Slashdot are made from Windows machines, I find it unbelievable that trash like this makes the front page, let alone goes unrefuted for this long.
Sheesh...
*sigh*
Unless this can be done remotely this is very old news. Every NT/2k/.net admin worth his salt has known this since nt4 if not before. It is the something if you have a slack or gentoo cd and have local access to linux box. There is not much that can be done if you have local access. In my mind this is what is wrong with the security world today. A lot of people taking shit like this to far. This is not an exploit and should not be treated as such. You should note it and not let just anyone have physical access to your network.
As early as Compaq's Deskpro 4000, there was:
- a software-controlled case-lock &
- a case-opened sensor
The box's firmware could be setup to use the
sensed indications that the case had been opened
(with or without use of the s-w-cont'd case-lock)
By the way, has anybody got code that can access
case-opened indicator and/or s-w-cont'd lock, eg
for us in an Open Source OS?
TIA