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Major Flaw Found In Cisco IOS Devices

Joff_NZ writes "CERT has released an advisory regarding a serious flaw in all Cisco routers and switches which run IOS and process IPv4 packets (i.e. pretty much everything), which causes the device to stop processing inbound packets, and so: 'The device must be rebooted to clear the input queue on the interface, and will not reload without user intervention.' There are apparently no known exploits (yet), and Cisco have this advisory with a workaround and available fixes."

266 comments

  1. Yet... by jerw134 · · Score: 5, Insightful

    There are apparently no known exploits (yet)

    I say we start a pool on how long yet will actually be, now that CERT released the info.

    1. Re:Yet... by jamesh · · Score: 3, Insightful

      I couldn't glean from the article exactly what packet would cause the failure. The ACL that was given as a workaround permitted typical protocols (eg tcp, udp, icmp, etc) and blocked the rest. Presumably somewhere in 'the rest' lies the exploit but it's a big space to search.

    2. Re:Yet... by sleeper0 · · Score: 5, Funny

      Between this announcement and the microsoft one I know at least one of the fine readers out there has cancelled all of their appointments for the next three days and has a case of mountain dew and a copy of worms for dummies under their arm whistling happily.

    3. Re:Yet... by rf0 · · Score: 5, Funny

      I'm going to say an exploit by tommorow. End of the internet by Sat. All back to normal on Monday

      Rus

    4. Re:Yet... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I'm going to work Sat just to watch the network guy try to download the IOS patch while the router is spewing smoke.

    5. Re:Yet... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Funny

      I call a book that can whistle pretty damn smart - knock off the 'dummies' stuff, mmkay?

    6. Re:Yet... by cscx · · Score: 4, Funny

      Yeah you would think more people would be using Juniper routers; however, I think they creepy-looking lady on their homepage is a deterrent.

    7. Re:Yet... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      At around 9:30pm EST I heard there was an exploit. It seems many ISPs know of it. I guess nobody wants the word to spread.

    8. Re:Yet... by Gogo+Dodo · · Score: 1, Interesting
      You forgot the bigger picture of her.

      Ehh... she's probably making more money than both of us.

    9. Re:Yet... by foniksonik · · Score: 1

      Ah but you forgot to link to the redemption page:

      goodstuff
      warning this page requires 'flash' (virus?worm?entertainment?)

      --
      A fool throws a stone into a well and a thousand sages can not remove it.
    10. Re:Yet... by bigberk · · Score: 3, Funny

      Where the hell did you find that? On my new big LCD monitor it looks like this lady is in the room right beside me. I'm not going to be able to sleep.

    11. Re:Yet... by AftanGustur · · Score: 1


      On my new big LCD monitor it looks like this lady is in the room right beside me. I'm not going to be able to sleep.

      Seriously, I can stand Ogrish and Rotten without a hitch, but somehow this lady gives me the creeps ...

      Print out that image in poster size and hang it up in your office.. Tell people that's your project manager to freak them out..

      --
      echo '[q]sa[ln0=aln80~Psnlbx]16isb572CCB9AE9DB03273snlbxq' |dc
    12. Re:Yet... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Interesting

      They have an awesome colletion of Anti-Cisco cartoons :)

      I think this one is on of the best:
      http://www.juniper.net/nettoons/03_1280.jpg

      (Just change the first number)

    13. Re:Yet... by Jellybob · · Score: 1, Funny

      I'm scared.

      And I thought the ebay lady was a little weird... the juniper one looks like she knows where I live, and she's gonna come round and hack me to death when I least expect it.

    14. Re:Yet... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Ohhhhh My Gawd!!!

      She looks like my Finance Director on a bad day!!!

    15. Re:Yet... by BadElf · · Score: 2, Funny

      Isn't that the gym teacher from Porky's?

    16. Re:Yet... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      We have a solution for this problem. Details and demo video at www.ddos.com - stand-alone prototypes are available and deployed at some high-risk sites (those with dDoS problems, obviously).

      The adult industry is currently being extorted ("pay or you get ddos'd", see WIRED), and this is likely prompting copycats on other industries. The Cisco issue just accellerates abuse options.

      Our blade-based system ("TIPS", for True Intrusion Prevention System; soon to be released) allows deployment BEFORE a router, which can either be looped in, or deployed as a blade behind the iSecure CyberWarfare Defense DDOS and CLOAKING module.

      White Paper and DVD (all region codes) available on request; the iSecure technology is globally patented.

      Thomas J. Ackermann
      iCEO & Chairman
      Melior, Inc (Dallas/TX)
      iSecure CyberWarfare Defense
      thomas@ddos.com

      (my old account on here is not working)

    17. Re:Yet... by namelessone99 · · Score: 1

      So I guess this means the Internet is going to be rebooted?

    18. Re:Yet... by SILIZIUMM · · Score: 1

      That would be great, because I'll go to a Lan Party this week-end so not having access to Internet during this period won't make me trouble at all :)

    19. Re:Yet... by Zeriel · · Score: 0

      Ahh, I love the smell of vaporware in the morning.

      --
      "America has done some terrible things. But I know that Americans don't cheer when innocents die." -Dave Barry
    20. Re:Yet... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Informative

      ok folks, here's how it works. A specially crafted packet is sent to an interface on a router. This packet takes up space in the queue on the interface. Once a few of these packets fill up that queue no more traffic is able to pass thru the interface. You won't see a high utilization on the CPU, it'll just throw'em away. It's important to understand that the packet has to be directed to the interface on the router, not just merely passing through it. After the queue fills up (around 4k I'm thinking)the only way to empty it is to reload, if I'm reading correctly. From what I can tell, the large back bones got the notice a few days ago. Some lower tier players received it yesterday. And public disclosure supposed to happen tonite around 21:00 EDT or so. However, several major internet players all of a sudden performing emergency maintenance, was a bit obvious. Especially when companies known to employ lots of Juniper didn't seem to do much. Well, guess it wasn't that OBVIOUS, but...net-eng people are worse than a small town knitting group.

    21. Re:Yet... by mecanicaz · · Score: 1

      I just received a phone call from my ISP stating that the service will be down to uograde their routers due to this flaw. They claimed there have been attacks in Europe, anybody can confirm this?

    22. Re:Yet... by EnVisiCrypt · · Score: 1

      It's like she's staring right into my soul... *shivers*

      --


      *everything* is Orwellian to cats.
    23. Re:Yet... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      ... Yet none of them are remotely funny.

    24. Re:Yet... by losmurfs · · Score: 3, Funny

      Just another example of using sex to sell products.

    25. Re:Yet... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Beulah Ballbricker

    26. Re:Yet... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      That's my mother you insensitive clod...

    27. Re:Yet... by EvilTwinSkippy · · Score: 1
      Between this announcement and the microsoft one I know at least one of the fine readers out there has cancelled all of their appointments for the next three days and has a case of mountain dew and a copy of worms for dummies under their arm whistling happily.

      Mountain dew, nah. The sugar makes me sleepy after 20 minutes. I prefer my caffiene to be like my soul: Dark, Bitter, and (slurp) Empty.

      --
      "Learning is not compulsory... neither is survival."
      --Dr.W.Edwards Deming
    28. Re:Yet... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0
      Ooh, the rare trifecta of stupid.

      1. American political 'satire'.
      2. Lamenting the loss of freedoms that you never had and haven't earned.
      3. Utterly no punctuation or capitalization.

      Very impressive. Please eat one of your undoubtedly several guns.

    29. Re:Yet... by Basje · · Score: 1

      Yesterday morning the service was flakey as hell over here, where it's usually quite solid. As was in several other places. Read the original announcement here on slashdot, there are several people stating the same. The exploit had probably already emerged.

      --
      the pun is mightier than the sword
    30. Re:Yet... by ---- · · Score: 1
      Use this to grab em all.
      !/bin/bash

      for((i=1;i<=19;i++))
      do
      PIC=${i}
      if (("${i}" <= 9))
      then
      PIC=0${PIC}
      fi

      wget http://www.juniper.net/nettoons/${PIC}_1280.jpg

      done
    31. Re:Yet... by DavidLJ · · Score: 1

      I think this shows that even the crackers must have a bit of hacker in them, i.e. they never wanted to bring the system down, just be pests a little bit.

      It's been obvious for years that if you wanted to do any real damage you'd go after the routers and bridges, (and possibly a couple of other things that are obvious to anybody who thinks, but don't need any more grief from script kiddies).

      Almost all cracking has gone on at the level of leaves, i.e. sites, rather than trunks, i.e. trunks. The highest up the food chain the crackers got was the distributed, and the pre-distributed zombie, denial of service attacks -- and both of these were invented by white-hats and CERT people months before black-hat stupidoes got around to stumbling across the ideas and trying them out.

      I think this all shows us something rather nice about the human race: the bad guys are mostly incompetent. The good guys are on the whole smart, hard-working, imaginative and effective.

      And the mischievous folks keep their mischief to where it doesn't do any harm.

  2. and no posting of the exploit code? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Interesting

    hmm... the cisco page shows up as 50 pages of text in lynx, with the first 20 being useful.

    a four-hour timeout for IP-4 packets and you can do it
    remotely to almost ANY cisco device except those that are run as purely IP-v6. Seems more like a nuisance DOS exploit and hope not to see it.

    1. Re:and no posting of the exploit code? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Insightful

      well if you could really lock out every path that had an unpatched ios box in it that would firmly be upgraded from a 'nuisance dos' to a 'really fucking huge the internet is closed right now dos' At least if it was the payload in a worm that could spread well. Considering theres no autopatcher for ios and the boxes are often tucked away in a closet and forgotten, I bet the first guy who puts this one out in the wild could hit the vast majority even if its months from now. I am sure core backhaul providers will be patched quickly but what good is a backbone if every destination goes out.

    2. Re:and no posting of the exploit code? by forged · · Score: 1

      Actually, your post _is_ insightful and should motivate people out there to consider using IPv6 now... Hehehe...

    3. Re:and no posting of the exploit code? by afidel · · Score: 2, Insightful

      No autopatchers for IOS, what the hell do you call CiscoWorks??? Just tell it all devices of type X should be on IOS version Y and it updates em.

      --
      There are 4 boxes to use in the defense of liberty: soap, ballot, jury, ammo. Use in that order. Starting now.
    4. Re:and no posting of the exploit code? by dillkvast · · Score: 3, Funny

      what the hell do you call CiscoWorks???

      Today "CiscoWorks" would probably be a contradiction in terms.

      --
      Scitne aliquis remedium potimum crapulae?
    5. Re:and no posting of the exploit code? by Cramer · · Score: 2, Insightful

      Somehow, I cannot see people paying 10,000$ for Ciscoworks just to upgrade all their routers at once. And judging from the way most of CW "works" I don't f***kin' trust it to muck with flash and reboot routers.

  3. It's days like this... by Nethead · · Score: 5, Funny

    It's days like this I'm REALLY glad that I'm a unemployyed network engineer! This looks like a very serious headache!

    --
    -- I have a private email server in my basement.
    1. Re:It's days like this... by rf0 · · Score: 4, Interesting

      I remeber the day Bind 8.2.2-P5 had an exploit come live. 24 hours and 56 servers later I finally managed to get to bed. Only to have to upgrade it all again a few days later.

      fun

      Rus

    2. Re:It's days like this... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Funny

      Pfft, you're a "network engineer" just like I'm a "computer surgeon" and that guy over there is an "electronics astronaut".

    3. Re:It's days like this... by TheMidget · · Score: 2, Insightful
      It's days like this I'm REALLY glad that I'm a unemployyed network engineer! This looks like a very serious headache!

      ... and since you're unemployed, this now more looks like an opportunity ;-)

    4. Re:It's days like this... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      You run 56 dns servers? That's interesting indeed.

    5. Re:It's days like this... by Zapman · · Score: 2, Informative

      1) If you have 56 internet facing DNS servers, it might be time to re-visit your design (with the possible exception of very large ISP's). Given BIND's history of security flaws, minimizing exposure is key.

      2) With that many servers, if you're not doing it with package management (solaris pkgadd, rpm, deb, hp..., AIX..., etc... all of them have at least a rudimentry package management tool, even if it's tar), you might want to re-visit your design.

      3) Deploying BIND without some forthought is going to get companies in trouble. If you can't be bothered, you really should just use DJB's DNS cache and DNS server.

      --
      Zapman
    6. Re:It's days like this... by Artifex · · Score: 1

      It's days like this I'm REALLY glad that I'm a unemployyed network engineer! This looks like a very serious headache!


      I'm also an unemployed network engineer... with Juniper training, to boot. :) Which means, even if I was on the job, I probably wouldn't have to worry too much about this from outside my network, anyway.

      --
      Get off my launchpad!
    7. Re:It's days like this... by EvilTwinSkippy · · Score: 1
      You should try MyDNS. Instead of farting around maintaining those REALLY cryptic config files, store all your DNS records in a relational database.

      Of course you REALLY want to lock down that database! (All of my servers clone a copy of a master database locked deep behind the firewall in my fortress of solitude. They also have iptables hooks to prevent ANYONE from accessing mysql except through the local socket.)

      --
      "Learning is not compulsory... neither is survival."
      --Dr.W.Edwards Deming
    8. Re:It's days like this... by sewagemaster · · Score: 1

      ...or a "software engineer"

  4. Alternative by rf0 · · Score: 4, Funny

    This is why I always suggest alternatives to Cisco such as IP over Avian and actual implementaion on Linux

    Rus

    1. Re:Alternative by MeNeXT · · Score: 1
      I upgraded to IPoA. Unfortunately I'm having problems with old ladies feeding them in the park...../DRUM ROLL

      --
      DRM? No thanks, I'll just get it somewhere else...
    2. Re:Alternative by mrbill · · Score: 3, Funny

      Yeah, but with IP over Avian Carriers, your "denial of service" is called "bubba with a shotgun".

    3. Re:Alternative by syzygy_001 · · Score: 1
      If that fails you can always revert to PoSP (Packet over Sheep Protocol)

      http://www.devilnet.net/rfc3203/rfc3203.html

    4. Re:Alternative by Misch · · Score: 1

      Yeah, but with IP over Sheep Carriers, your "denial of service" is called "Emeril LaGasse with a shotgun".

      --

      --You will rephrase your request for me to go to hell. Goto statements are not acceptable programming constructs
    5. Re:Alternative by EvilTwinSkippy · · Score: 2, Funny

      Our facility tested it out, but concluded IPOA is for the birds.

      --
      "Learning is not compulsory... neither is survival."
      --Dr.W.Edwards Deming
    6. Re:Alternative by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      So a Scotish farmer is only a delay in the routing of PoSP?

  5. Whoa, very interesting!! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Interesting
    CERT has released an advisory regarding a serious flaw in all Cisco routers and switches which run IOS and process IPv4 packets (i.e. pretty much everything), which causes the device to stop processing inbound packets, and so: 'The device must be rebooted to clear the input queue on the interface, and will not reload without user intervention.' There are apparently no known exploits (yet)
    I wouldn't be so sure of that. A couple of days ago, my cable modem (and others in the area) started having problems where the connection randomly drops and it takes awhile to get it back. As if maybe a router somewhere has gone down and needs rebooted..

    If I fire up Ethereal to peek at the traffic, I notice that the arp who-has requests are labeled with a source of "cisco_f2" ...

    Wonder if someone has been pointing this sploit at cablemodem routers ??
    1. Re:Whoa, very interesting!! by MrMickS · · Score: 4, Informative

      Cisco Cable Modems run a version of IOS. However they have private IP addresses on the cable side and pass thru the DHCP requests that your device(s) make to the providers DHCP server. Unless your cable provider's network has been compromised I doubt that this is related to your problem.

      --
      You may think me a tired, old, cynic. I'd have to disagree about the tired bit.
    2. Re:Whoa, very interesting!! by Florian+Weimer · · Score: 1

      The cable provider could have made an emergency update of its CPE, but that's rather unlikely.

    3. Re:Whoa, very interesting!! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Considering your ISP's gateway is a Cisco, arp requests coming from a Cisco MAC are not that unusual.

    4. Re:Whoa, very interesting!! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Whoa !! I wonder if you just a Dumb Ass!

  6. Disclosure of vulnerabilities by losttoy · · Score: 2, Troll

    Notice how both vulnerabilities, from Cisco and Microsoft, were not released to the public first. Instead the public announcement comes after the vendors have the patches.

    Exploits, anybody?

    1. Re:Disclosure of vulnerabilities by eskimoboy · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Sometimes, it's in the best interest of the public to have vulnerability information released directly when it is found out. It opens up the ability for hackers to create exploits before the manufacturers have a chance to find a way to stop it. Sure, releasing information on vulnerabilities for open source projects right away is usually a good idea, but that's due to the fact that with an open source project, the public has the ability to come up with a patch. In cases like these, perhaps it is best for the public to be left out until a proper solution or workaround has been developed by the vendors.

    2. Re:Disclosure of vulnerabilities by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Oh really? But why NFS Bug was not been released to public on the same day, June 10, but rather a more than a month later when fixes were ready?

    3. Re:Disclosure of vulnerabilities by losttoy · · Score: 1

      I agree disclosure is a tricky situation. On the other side, would you like to keep running vulnerable services till the vendor patches them? What if in the meantime someone else finds the same vuln and exploits it? Or what if the the person/group who released the advisory *inadvertently* release it to the public or worsse, to a set of crackers?

      IMHO, there has to be a mid-day between disclosure only to vendor and full public disclosure. Maybe bugs+exploits can be submitted to a mailing list with auto-approval set to two days?? And a CC to the vendor.

    4. Re:Disclosure of vulnerabilities by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      The big flaw in your thinking is that the hacker community finds out about this stuff from CERT. When a CERT bulliten hits it's usually days/weeks after the exploit/vulnerability is well known.

  7. Moderators slacking badly ... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    ... it's been at least 4 minutes :-)

  8. No Exploits My A$$ by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Interesting

    AT&T has been having problems all over the west coast the last 4 days. Ill bet even money this is why. There last 2 emails state they had no clue what was causing it and that random reboot's of routers were to be expected.

    Im not Anonymous, Just Lazy.
    Crackers`n`Soup

    1. Re:No Exploits My A$$ by hta · · Score: 1

      Installing the patch?
      I'll bet AT&T knew this before today.

  9. Two reference implementations required? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    The implementation described in the 2nd link does seem like a good starting point, but aren't two distinct implementations required before IETF will provide official backing?

    1. Re:Two reference implementations required? by GammaTau · · Score: 1

      The implementation described in the 2nd link does seem like a good starting point, but aren't two distinct implementations required before IETF will provide official backing?

      I suggest that African and European swallow are used as reference implementations.

    2. Re:Two reference implementations required? by sn0wcrash · · Score: 1

      I find the African and European swallow to be a ppor refrence. I highly recomend the peregrine falcon as the refrence implementation due to it's higher overall speed.

  10. Whoa, get a clue! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Nice idea though, but you obviously have the technical knowledge of a bat.

  11. At least it won't worm. by Valar · · Score: 5, Insightful

    At least it only freezes the device. If you could make it send the same packet to some of it's router buddies, then freeze, this could get real bad, real fast.

    1. Re:At least it won't worm. by Grizzletooth · · Score: 1

      Why do you think it can't worm?

      The advisory says that the packets have to be directed at the router's IP. Not just passed thru it. So the attackers could scan for cisco's and target them individually.

      This is a Russian Warning Shot waiting to happen. When the router in front of you gets hit, and you are off the net, what do you do with that router that wasn't hit yet?

      Update early and often.

    2. Re:At least it won't worm. by Valar · · Score: 2, Informative

      Yeah, but that just means that it can take out networks behind targetted routers, that doesn't mean it can self propagate, Great Worm style. Sysadmins should already be doing their best to mask the type of routing and switching eq they use (which would minimize the possibility of sucessful scans). So far, this exploit can only propagate down the tree, not sideways.

    3. Re:At least it won't worm. by Elwood+P+Dowd · · Score: 1

      Right. So you write your warhol worm using the MS Windows exploits revealed today. Make it so they communicate with each other p2p, and whenever you feel like it, give them the signal to freeze every cisco device they can find.

      You might be able to cripple big chunks of the internet every time you do it, and it's probably be a long time before all the zombies got fixed. Anybody out there run a webserver? How many Nimda/Code Red requests did you get today? Nimda wasn't even a very smart worm.

      --

      There are no trails. There are no trees out here.
    4. Re:At least it won't worm. by _bug_ · · Score: 1

      Worm? Maybe not, but something just bad would be very simple to concoct.

      All you need is the output from a traceroute and attack the IP addresses in reverse order. You'll take down router after router in no-time.

      Identifying key routers on the Internet is probably trivial at best.

      This all assumes Cicsco routers are in use. But it wouldn't be hard at all for a cracker to at least try and make life miserable.

    5. Re:At least it won't worm. by ZPO · · Score: 1

      I don't think its status as a worm really matters much.

      All an individual has to do is something like this:

      1 - Generate a list of hosts on the net

      2 - Grab the first host off the list

      3 - traceroute to the host

      4 - send 10-20 of the "specially crafted packets" to each hop in reverse order

      5 - cache the IP addresses that have been used

      6 - Loop around and start again on the next host. Skip addresses that have already been done.

      Its not that hard folks. Get enough machines running something like the above and we will have some very serious problems.

      I leave it up to your imagination on how to deniably inject the packets into the net.

    6. Re:At least it won't worm. by EvilTwinSkippy · · Score: 1

      You fail to realize this is a self limiting system. You can only take out so many routers between you and the internet before you yourself are cut off, and or bogged down in a deluge of diverted traffic.

      --
      "Learning is not compulsory... neither is survival."
      --Dr.W.Edwards Deming
    7. Re:At least it won't worm. by ZPO · · Score: 1

      I realize that is the case. Unfortunately with a typical cable modem/DSL system you'll be able to do a fair bit of damage before you cut yourself off. Every time the links come up you take them down again. Combine this with a little wardriving around a large metro area and you've got a very large problem for the engineers. If you've got a large botnet you can do even more.

      I was presenting it more as food for thought than a suggestion of an attack method. I'm on the other side of the food-chain for such things (network engineer) so I didn't post a full and complete dissertation.

  12. moderators on crack by TMB · · Score: 0

    Interesting? Informative? Troll??!

    How about "Funny"? :-)

    [TMB]

  13. The ACL "fix" is not a fix by jgaynor · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Here's the reccomendation for a temporary workaround using ACls:

    Cisco recommends that all IOS devices which process IPv4 packets be configured to block traffic directed to the router from any unauthorized source with the use of Access Control Lists (ACLs). Legitimate traffic is defined as management protocols such as telnet, snmp or ssh, and configured routing protocols from explicitly allowed peers. All other traffic destined to the device should be blocked at the input interface.

    Does "A rare sequence of crafted IPv4 packets sent directly to the device" mean a sequence utilizing one of these three protocols? If so then frigging tell us! If not, this is just a vague precautionary warning that really won't stop any user inside the network from exploiting the bug.

    The TRUE details of the bug, including which protocol it uses, would help us put a nail in the coffin regarding the ACL workaround, but the Cisco bug tool isn't returning any information for the bugs they're talking about - specifically CSCea02355 and CSCdz71127.

    1. Re:The ACL "fix" is not a fix by vrt3 · · Score: 1
      I have the impression you missed "... from explicitly allowed peers".

      --
      This sig under construction. Please check back later.
    2. Re:The ACL "fix" is not a fix by packethead · · Score: 1

      Or is it safe to say that you can block all traffic *to* the device, but allow forwarding IAW your standard set of acls?

      Personally, I prefer minicom from an SSH box for management of routers and the like.

      --
      .sig
  14. Of course there are exploits by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Unless an exploit appears, it is extremely rare that massively overworked and inevitably underpaid development departments (that applies to everyone everywhere) will ever notice a bug in code that they have already released.

    At best one can hope that the "exploit" is actually normal use that is unintentionally triggering the bug, and that they've noticed because a customer has raised a ticket about it with them. Keep those fingers crossed though, as a vulnerability in IOS will take many months to clear worldwide.

  15. Latest news .... by Snoopy77 · · Score: 5, Funny

    While the army took time to celebrate the discover and safe return of Major Flaw it still maintained the need to continue the search for other missing top ranking officials. We spoke with a member of the search and recovery team soon after Major Flaw was discovered.

    "It is great to have found Major Flaw but we are still very worried about the others. Our job here is not finished." said Private Data.

    Colonel Panic has been spotted from time to time but the army has not yet been able to pinpoint his exact position. But the most gravest of fears are held for General Protection-Fault. Sightings of the General have been few and far between in the last few years. Some conspiracy theorists say that he is not actually missing but has disguised himself. Private Data would not confirm wether they are searching for a man of similar build to General Protection-Fault but dressed all in blue.

    --
    "She's a West Texas girl, just like me" - G.W Bush Iraqis
    1. Re:Latest news .... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I give +5, Creative...

      Too bad Im not into this karma thing (well, at least here in /.)... though, Colonel Panic didnt fit very well.

      But Im no English speaker, maybe theres something escaping my undertstanding here.

      Well done!

    2. Re:Latest news .... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I think he was aluding to a kernel panic.

    3. Re:Latest news .... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      'Colonel' is pronounced like 'kernel'-- it always confused me too, and I've been speaking English since birth :P

  16. Re:I don't want to start a holy war by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Yeah! Goofy assed IOS! What's up with that? I'd really like to know who bunch of engineers came came up with their implementation of Radius support or telephony support

  17. Re:I don't want to start a holy war by jhereg · · Score: 1

    Are you sure you don't want to start a holy war?

    Anyway yes Cisco has problems just like all the
    other vendors. I have no idea how you are
    trying to compare a hub and a switch attached
    to different boxes for their performance. Maybe
    there is a misconfiguration in the Catalyst.
    A 4 port belkin hub is little less likely to have
    that issue

    Of course if you are really trying to use a catalyst to
    ROUTE traffic maybe you just are using
    the wrong tool.

    YMMV

  18. Whoa, stop insulting bats! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Bats are very intelligent creatures, I'll have you know.

    If the programmers of IOS were replaced by bats, I can guarantee that there would be no vulnerabilities like this one in the code.

  19. What to do? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    In the time between this announcement and the Microsoft one I know at least one of the readers out there has cancelled all of their appointments for the next 3 days and has an entire case of Mountain Dew and a copy of "Worms for Dummies" under their arm whistling happily.

    1. Re:What to do? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      thanks for capitalizing and punctuating that. how much are we paying you? you deserve a raise. of course we are putting cover sheets on our gramatically sanitized jokes now

  20. There ARE exploits in the wild by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Interesting

    The claim that there are no exploits is false.

    Below is a note I received from my ISP about 2 hours before this was topic posted:

    =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=

    17/07/03 01.12 - 01.38 DOS Attack on Sydney PoPs

    Incident

    A DoS attack against the AN border router resulted in that router's CPU reaching 100% and triggering the same attack on the Perth gateway router which in turn brought down the Comindico Border router

    Action

    While all of the hardware remained 'up' nothing could be authenticated and therefore all traffic through the Sydney PoP ceased.

    Resolution

    Swiftel Engineering rebooted the Perth Gateway router clearing the DoS packets and that in turn allowed the Sydney routers to rebuild the BGP4 tables thus restoring the ability to process customer traffic.

    Result

    By 1.38 pm all traffic was flowing normally.

    Future Elimination Of This Problem

    The elimination of this type of new DoS attack has just been recognised and released by Cisco (today) and the workaround and fixes are documented in:

    http://www.cisco.com/warp/public/707/cisco-sa-20 03 0717-blocked.shtml

    We are considering whether to implement the workarounds which may impact traffic such as ICQ and some games or upgrade the IOS's in all of our Cisco equipment.

    We will inform you when that decision is made.

    1. Re:There ARE exploits in the wild by Zeddicus_Z · · Score: 1

      That's funny, because we're on the Sydney Comindico PoP and havn't had any link downtime today at all.

      Of course, there have been a few incidents over the past week where our link dropped for between three and ten minutes at a time. Comindico's network status page explained them as "router rebooted", no more details.

      But anyway, none today.

      --
      Janie took my gun...
    2. Re:There ARE exploits in the wild by forged · · Score: 3, Informative
      You don't understand: this isn't a DOS attack that Cisco is warning about.

      Once the input queue is full of said packets, the router doesn't accept any more packets, then CPU utilization drops at 0% while the router idles waiting for more apckets (which of course never arrive once the device is blocked).

    3. Re:There ARE exploits in the wild by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      this only effected customers on one of our wholesale routers. ie business customers only.

    4. Re:There ARE exploits in the wild by pe1chl · · Score: 1

      Then why is this not a denial of service?

    5. Re:There ARE exploits in the wild by Florian+Weimer · · Score: 3, Informative

      According to Cisco, high CPU utilization is not a result of the present defect.

      The ISP was probably experiencing an ordinary DoS attack.

    6. Re:There ARE exploits in the wild by forged · · Score: 1

      Not in the traditional sense where router CPU goes to 100% and router starts dropping packets, essentially by flooding. You have a point, it's a DOS, just not like we know them.

    7. Re:There ARE exploits in the wild by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Denial of Service attacks have nothing to do with whether a processor on anything gets spiked to 100%. DoS means that access to some SERVICE (IP network services, email service, pr0n, etc) is not available to someone who should (under normal circumstances) have access to said service.

      Nowhere has anyone ever stated that a prerequisite for a DoS attack was bringing a device to its knees by maxing out the processor.

      Powering off a device could be considered a "low-tech" DoS... hence physical security at data-centres.

    8. Re:There ARE exploits in the wild by SlightOverdose · · Score: 1

      iiNET (QLD) has been up and down like a yoyo for the last few days. I guess this is why.

    9. Re:There ARE exploits in the wild by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      "The claim that there are no exploits is false."

      "gateway router which in turn brought down the Comindico Border router "

      COMPLETE FUD(tm), comindico has not at any time lost a router due to the Cisco bug, in fact I'm not aware of anyone that has.

      --
      jrs

  21. Department of Homeland Security is interested! by dekashizl · · Score: 5, Funny

    This is actually good news for Cisco, because security holes like this appear to be a prerequisite for getting a large Department of Homeland Security contract.

  22. Can you say RUSH JOB?!? by Grizzletooth · · Score: 2, Informative

    It is nearly midnite on the left coast and the updates for this bug are still not available for download.

    Also interesting to note is that the top of the Cisco Advisory had a release date of 7/17 00:00 GMT. But the bottom said that it would not be published to the public until 7/17 21:00 GMT.

    Why the release 21 hours ahead of schedule? Especially since you can't d/l the patches!!

    1. Re:Can you say RUSH JOB?!? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Patches have been available for several days.

      I suspect they released the advisory ahead of their intended schedule because it got leaked somewhere.

    2. Re:Can you say RUSH JOB?!? by Grizzletooth · · Score: 1

      Untrue. I have been on the phone for hours this evening with Cisco SEs and they said they were waiting for the images to be completed and ready for distribution.

      Apparently some "trains" (cisco IOS releases) were completed earlier for the major backbone providers, but the rest appear to have been feverishly being built this afternoon and evening.

    3. Re:Can you say RUSH JOB?!? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      It again shows how antiquated and troublesome the single-image-file-IOS is.

  23. Yikes... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    I bought my 2611 router on ebay. It is running v12.0(5)T1. Does this mean I have to sign up for a support contract just to get this bug fix?

    1. Re:Yikes... by Grizzletooth · · Score: 5, Informative

      No, the advisory states that non-contract customers can send an email to tac@cisco.com and get access to a "free upgrade".

    2. Re:Yikes... by forged · · Score: 1

      You can always contact the seller and ask them for the license :->

  24. "A great disturbance..." by mino · · Score: 4, Funny

    "Like millions of sysadmins cried out in terror -- then were silenced."

  25. wow by revmoo · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Sounds pretty bad.

    I got this email earlier:

    Special Emergency Service Affecting Maintenance Dear Cogent Customer, With this message, we are notifying you of a special, emergency maintenance that will affect your service beginning at 3:00 a.m. tomorrow, Thursday July 17. The service outage you will experience is expected to be ten minutes or less. Cogent Communications takes very seriously its responsibility for maintaining a robust, well-performing network, and only due to extreme circumstances would we ask your indulgence for an emergency maintenance of this type. Please be assured that Cogent engineers will do everything possible to minimize your down time and its associated inconvenience. If you have any problems with your connection after this maintenance is complete, or if you have any questions regarding the maintenance at any point, please call Customer Service at 1-877-7COGENT and use this work order number: XXXXXX. We sincerely appreciate your patience and welcome any feedback. We apologize for the short notice.

    Thank you for being a Cogent customer.

    Sincerely,
    Customer Support
    Cogent Communications

    And was wondering what was up. Been hearing about a lot of router issues from various people. Lets hope this gets wrapped up quickly.

    --
    I would expect such blatant racism on Fark, but on Slashdot? Mods please ban this asshole.
    1. Re:wow by traid · · Score: 1

      I got the same email from my ISP. Bastards!!!! Special Emergency Service Affecting Maintenance Dear Cogent Customer, With this message, we are notifying you of a special, emergency maintenance that will affect your service beginning at 3:00 a.m. tomorrow, Thursday July 17. The service outage you will experience is expected to be ten minutes or less. Cogent Communications takes very seriously its responsibility for maintaining a robust, well-performing network, and only due to extreme circumstances would we ask your indulgence for an emergency maintenance of this type. Please be assured that Cogent engineers will do everything possible to minimize your down time and its associated inconvenience. If you have any problems with your connection after this maintenance is complete, or if you have any questions regarding the maintenance at any point, please call Customer Service at 1-877-7COGENT and use this work order number: XXXX. We sincerely appreciate your patience and welcome any feedback. We apologize for the short notice.

      --
      None of us are as dumb as all of us.
    2. Re:wow by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      ..there are still Cogent customers???

      Crackers`n`Soup

    3. Re:wow by Cramer · · Score: 1

      What's with all the nuts blindly grabbing new IOS images and reloading routers? Do they not know how much new shit they may be breaking in the process.

      I have yet to update an IOS version and not have some new inventively screwed up. (bugs fixed in one release, undone in another and so forth.) Cisco makes good stuff, but their quality has fallen through the floor in recent years.

  26. Wonder what kind of packet causes it. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    It isnt tcp, udp, gre, or icmp according to the acls that cisco provides in the article to protect against the problem.

    Gotta be something major obscure.

  27. This has been discussed...... by flirzan · · Score: 5, Interesting

    ...on NANOG most of the day today. It looks like Cisco discovered the vulnerability in their own testing, notified major backbone providers (AT&T, Qwest, Sprint, L3, etc), who then scheduled emergency maintenance, which in turn tipped off savvy network engineers all over the place, who started wondering what was up, which in turn generated enough interest that bits and pieces leaked, and I bet Cisco figured better to release the advisory now and end the speculation than to wait till tomorrow. As for the "no exploit available", I had a router with an uptime of many many moons hang for no apparent reason tonight...while working on that I found the cisco advisory in my inbox. Could be a coincidence, but it's a strange one.

    --
    Twinkies sure taste good for something that is 68% air.
    1. Re:This has been discussed...... by namelessone99 · · Score: 2, Informative

      Check out this for a full listing of the sprint maintenances. They are upgrading every router across the globe!

    2. Re:This has been discussed...... by Florian+Weimer · · Score: 2, Insightful

      At the moment, the impact of this defect is downtime because of hasty emergency router maintaince.

    3. Re:This has been discussed...... by Cramer · · Score: 1

      What hardware and IOS were you using? I saw the same "output queue" filling problem with a 7401 a year ago. And it took bloody forEVER to get them to fix it. (it was a frame-relay packet queing priority error -- lmi status would get pushed into the head of the packet queue, transmit, and not be removed... 21 minutes later, the interface dies.)

      (That's why my 7401's are running the never-released 12.2.9S. And will not be changing them even at gun point.)

    4. Re:This has been discussed...... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      It is a coincidence, since the flaw only flags the buffers not to empty, so they fill up and traffic stops flowing. It doesn't crash the router, it just leaves you with a dead interface.

  28. what did you say about my mother... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    ...you insensitive clod. creepy people have feelings too you know. :)

  29. Odds Of Resulting Problems? by rsmith-mac · · Score: 2, Insightful

    With this exploit now out there(at least in theory anyway), I guess the question now becomes what can we expect from it. Assuming that a black-hat or someone else of an infamous nature figures out this exploit, what are the ramficiations that we can expect? Obviously, many routers are owned and run by compotent admins, but with all the Cisco routers out there, it's niaeve to believe that all of the routers will be fixed before someone exploits this. Given that, what does everyone suppose will happen to the internet as a whole? The core routers will most likely be fixed ASAP, but there's always the problem of the "oopps, I forgot that one" router. Will this exploit become the ever-lasting Code Red(in terms of network problems), or will its threat blow over just like Code Red?

    1. Re:Odds Of Resulting Problems? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Insightful

      ... with all the Cisco routers out there ...

      It gets worse: this affects a lot of Cisco's switches too. And nobody pays attention to the switches until they break...

    2. Re:Odds Of Resulting Problems? by NetJunkie · · Score: 1

      A switch shouldn't be available to target from the outside, or even the inside. They should be on a seperate management VLAN.

    3. Re:Odds Of Resulting Problems? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      How naive are you ? The exploit is obviously already there. If you had ever ever visited a company like Cisco you would know that their entire focus is on bug testing the code that has not been released yet. They would not bug test old code unless TAC had a call from multiple customers confirming bugs.

    4. Re:Odds Of Resulting Problems? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      All of these routers everyone is scrambling to upgrade should be accessible only from management networks too. Are they? Of course not.

    5. Re:Odds Of Resulting Problems? by NetJunkie · · Score: 1

      A router without an addressable interface is of very little use. A switch on the other hand, shouldn't have an IP reachable interface (to the public). Very large difference.

    6. Re:Odds Of Resulting Problems? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Look at the Cisco-recommended "workaround" ACLs. It's just like the typical firewall recommendation for broadband customers. The routers do not need to be accessible to the public. Addressable interfaces for management, yes. Public, no.

    7. Re:Odds Of Resulting Problems? by NetJunkie · · Score: 1

      If the interface isn't addressable, how does a packet get to the next hop?

    8. Re:Odds Of Resulting Problems? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      The emphasis should be on "accessible". Even then, for most L2 topologies, the L3 address doesn't matter for hop-to-hop relaying. IP headers don't contain the address of their next hop for typical (not source-routed) operation.

  30. Comcast has been having problems all day... by SlashChick · · Score: 4, Interesting

    I'm in the Bay Area, and my Comcast (formerly ATTBI) cable modem connection has been having issues all day. This router kept crashing earlier today:

    tbr1-p013601.sffca.ip.att.net [12.122.11.77] (hop #6 after my cable modem)

    I have no idea what the problem is or whether it's related to this exploit, but it really stinks to have the connection continually crash. I actually haven't had problems in the last few months... until today. I hope this isn't a harbinger of things to come...

    1. Re:Comcast has been having problems all day... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Funny
      Sick of your web host crashing? 100% guaranteed network uptime.
      ...until/unless a Cisco DDoS vulnerability is found...
    2. Re:Comcast has been having problems all day... by flirzan · · Score: 1

      AT&T had an OC192 (9.95Gb/s) between St. Louis and San Francisco down today for a while, caused some havoc with various providers who use them for transit.

      --
      Twinkies sure taste good for something that is 68% air.
    3. Re:Comcast has been having problems all day... by Jeremiah+Cornelius · · Score: 1

      I'm on Speakeasy (Covad) in SF. Total outage for several hours tonight. Probably a desparate, unscheduled scrample to get these Ciscos patched!

      --
      "Flyin' in just a sweet place,
      Never been known to fail..."
    4. Re:Comcast has been having problems all day... by SlashChick · · Score: 1
      > "Sick of your web host crashing? 100% guaranteed network uptime."

      "...until/unless a Cisco DDoS vulnerability is found..."

      It's true... it could happen. But since our 100% uptime guarantee comes directly from MFN/Abovenet, we can be reimbursed for any downtime.

      Plus, if we go down, so do many other, larger companies, such as Google (which is in the same datacenter we are) will go down as well. We certainly won't be the only ones hung out to dry. :)
    5. Re:Comcast has been having problems all day... by rekoil · · Score: 1

      Interesting, Speakeasy in Washington, DC was down last night as well from about 1:45 until about 4:am or so.

      How do I know? I was working on fixing my own routers at the time... :(

    6. Re:Comcast has been having problems all day... by lesceil277 · · Score: 1

      I guess it is because of that CISCO problem http://www.cisco.com/warp/public/707/cisco-sa-2003 0717-blocked.shtml I don't know if it is related, but I just spent 2 hours on the phone to activate my new comcast.net account using dhcpcd and opera on Linux instead of their braindead windows CD. I had to reregister since the attbi.com account finally stopped working as they are moving everybody over to comcast.net. Since it was such a pain to find out, I summarized it on http://micha.bloki.com/index.jsp?name=comcastLinux Cheers, Michael Will

  31. mmmm by Daffy · · Score: 1

    if this is what i think it is, it only takes about 10 frames (8+ is the word) to stop a switch (and i guess now the routers) in their tracks requiring a manual reboot.

    -d

  32. Re:Troll ( Hubs are faster than switches) by slashnik · · Score: 1

    The above post so looks loke a troll, however in case the poster is serious and is in need of a whack with a clue stick...

    Hubs / repeaters / fanouts work at the electrical signal level.

    Bridges / Switches work at the frame level.

    In limited circumstances i.e. there are only two devices talking on the segment the cheap hub may well be faster than any $20,000 switch.

    Start throwing more devices, full-duplex operation etc. into the conversation and you will soon see the light.

    Now when you have touched a network outside of your bedroom please feel free to respond

    slashnik

  33. Will Homeland Security have kept it under wraps?? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Interesting

    What I really wonder wonder about is whether the vulnerability has been kept under wrap by the the Department of Homeland Security, just like they did with the Sendmail vulnerability of a short while ago, which was kept from the world for a couple of weeks. The US-military had at least a full week maintenance time before the rest of the world got it.

    As a non-american I found this quite disturbing, since certainly with the Sendmail vulnerability, there was a risk of this being exploited by the US-governement against foreign nations. NOw, I know I am just being paranoid, but it does freak me if this would become standard operating procedure: 1. Vulnerability discovered 2. US government given ample time to protect itself 3. US government makes use of vulnerability 4. Us gov releases it to friendly nations 5. You get notified.

  34. Let me see that flaw by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Funny

    This thing right here
    Is lettin all the geeks know
    What CERT talks about
    You know
    The major flaws in hardware
    Hahaha
    Check it out

    Ooh dat packet so scandalous
    And ya know this router couldn't handle it
    See ya shakin that fist cause you paid for it
    With a look in ya eye so BOFHish

    Uh
    Ya liked it a lot till the processing stops
    And ya job was secure till da connection dropped
    No time to sleep you'll reboot a lot
    Cuz the router's completely loca

    The core dumps like a truck truck truck
    Admins like what the f^@%t
    Press the power butt butt butt
    Uh
    I think I need to reboot it again
    The core dumps like a truck truck truck
    Admins like what the f^@%t
    All night long
    Let me see that flaw

  35. Just filter out packets with the evil bit by AaronW · · Score: 5, Funny

    Why not just filter out all the packets with the evil bit set? This should fix the problem.

    --
    This post is encrypted twice with ROT-13. Documenting or attempting to crack this encryption is illegal.
  36. duh by blosphere · · Score: 2, Insightful

    Well, I can safely predict that alot of the 12xxx routers are going to reload/have reloaded already. At least if you don't have a Juniper sitting on your core, you most likely have 12xxx series one. And try to apply an acl on their interfaces... bye bye router :)

    1. Re:duh by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      And try to apply an acl on their interfaces... bye bye router

      Ummm, could you explain what you mean by this?!

      We have a T1 running to our office, with a cisco router inside that was setup many years ago and never touched since. Now we're trying to get up to speed on all this.....

  37. Just got this from Internap: by flirzan · · Score: 5, Informative

    To all Internap customers:

    Cisco Systems has released to the public notification of a vulnerability
    in many versions of Cisco IOS which can create a Denial of Service on an
    affected router. The details of the advisory can be viewed at the
    following link:

    http://www.cisco.com/warp/public/707/cisco-sa-20 03 0717-blocked.shtml

    No exploits which target this vulnerability have yet been identified.

    Prior to the public notification, Cisco had contacted their major NSP
    customers including Internap to inform us of this vulnerability. Internap
    has identified IOS versions with the appropriate fix for the platforms in
    our network and scheduled upgrades to our routers. Customers will receive
    notification shortly of the window in which the routers you are homed to
    will be upgraded. Due to the severity of this vulnerability these
    upgrades are being performed as emergency maintenance.

    Customers with questions about the possible impact of this vulnerability on
    their own equipment are urged to read the notice at the link above or to
    contact Cisco directly.

    --
    Twinkies sure taste good for something that is 68% air.
    1. Re:Just got this from Internap: by frankie · · Score: 2, Insightful
      Flirzan, just wondering, why do you host with Internap? Are you a spammer?
    2. Re:Just got this from Internap: by Tancred · · Score: 1

      Every large network provider has a spam problem. Check UUNet, Qwest, etc. Also check a few other clients of Internap. [Disclaimer - I know people at Internap.]

  38. The cries of thousands of Cisco 827's by xQx · · Score: 3, Funny

    Wow, It's times like this I'm happy I'm not a sysadmin for a DSL service provider with heaps of customers with 827s around. ... oh wait.

    Boss. I'm at the pub.

  39. Yes it is by forged · · Score: 5, Insightful
    Actually, the proposed workaround works very well (it wouldn't be a workaround otherwise).

    Don't misunderstand traffic going THROUGH the router with traffic directed TO the router. You probably want to control the latter because as a good netadmin you should know that this is good practise.

    1. Re:Yes it is by Florian+Weimer · · Score: 1

      You probably want to control the latter because as a good netadmin you should know that this is good practise.

      Proper filtering of packets trageted at the router helps to make it more robust against DoS attacks directed at the router itself. Actually, most people already have such filters in place (especially on IOS versions which support IP receive ACLs).

    2. Re:Yes it is by jsailor · · Score: 1


      Agreed. This type of filtering should be there anyway. How many of you leave TELNET, finger, and others running on your systems?

      It's somewhat common for lazier corporations to leave this type of stuff off, but any sane network-guy in a decent company puts this type of stuff in. For ISPs it's shouldn't even be questioned.

    3. Re:Yes it is by pe1chl · · Score: 1

      When you are running NAT with static portmappings to allow outside connections (e.g. to SMTP or HTTP servers), you will have traffic directed at the router IP, but the router will actually forward it and not process it (you can hope).

      Will this traffic, once let in by the input ACL, expose you to this bug?
      Or is only traffic really handled by the TCP stack in the router (telnet, ssh etc) involved?

  40. HAHAHAHA by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    HAHAHAHAHA... Cogent?!

    "Thank you for being a Cogent customer."

    Yeah, because you're one of the two Cogent customers left... :P

    *grin*

  41. Re:Exploits, anybody? by forged · · Score: 1
    Sometimes it is in the best interest of the greater number out there not to be notified until after the patches are in place in critical places.

    Thinking about shutting down the Internet today ? I think I prefer to keep my job :-)

  42. Re: MOD PARENT +5 funny by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0


    Dang... I just wasted all my mod points on them darned +insightful and +interesting posts!

    OFFTOPIC? Some geeks wouldn't know a joke if it bit them in the asci

  43. Dilbert by forged · · Score: 4, Funny
    Today's strip.

    Boss: Look what one of our engineers said to a reporter !
    Dogbert: (reading) "Our technology is putrid, but we compensate by ignoring complaints."
    Boss: You know what would be more fun than fixing those problems ?
    Dogbert: WITCH-HUNT !!!

    1. Re:Dilbert by Yottabyte84 · · Score: 1

      That's catbert.

  44. "$u713 h1n7" by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    C@n u h@x0r5 s@y 'NTP'?
    |}y 7h3 w@y, 1 /-\|\/| wr171ng @ M$ w0rm. S7@y 700n3d.

  45. Are CBOS Devices Vulnerable? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Interesting

    Sorry if this is a dumb question, but are DSL and other broadband router devices running CBOS 2.x.x such as Cisco 675 and 678s vulnerable or is CBOS a different critter with different TCP packet handling code?

    1. Re:Are CBOS Devices Vulnerable? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      No. Only devices running IOS are vulnerable.

  46. Interesting.... by slayer99 · · Score: 3, Informative

    "Obtaining Fixed Software

    Customers with contracts should obtain upgraded software free of charge through their regular update channels. For most customers, this means that upgrades should be obtained through the Software Center on the Cisco worldwide website at http://www.cisco.com/tacpage/sw-center/sw-ios.shtm l.

    Customers whose Cisco products are provided or maintained through prior or existing agreement with third-party support organizations such as Cisco Partners, authorized resellers, or service providers should contact that support organization for assistance with obtaining the free software upgrade(s).

    Customers who purchase direct from Cisco but who do not hold a Cisco service contract and customers who purchase through third-party vendors but are unsuccessful at obtaining fixed software through their point of sale should get their upgrades by contacting the Cisco Technical Assistance Center (TAC). TAC contacts are as follows.

    +1 800 553 2447 (toll free from within North America)

    +1 408 526 7209 (toll call from anywhere in the world)

    e-mail: tac@cisco.com"

    So, if I understand this correctly, if you've given Cisco money for hardware _and_ given Cisco money for a support contract, only then can you get hold of the fix. Neat.

    --
    Martin Brooks / Slayer99 #linux / UIN 2178117
    1. Re:Interesting.... by slayer99 · · Score: 1


      No, I didn't understand it correctly. :)

      But it will make getting a fix for Cisco kit of unknown provenance a bit trickier.

      --
      Martin Brooks / Slayer99 #linux / UIN 2178117
    2. Re:Interesting.... by ckan · · Score: 3, Informative

      I had previously called tac@cisco.com for security patches for our Cisco devices not covered by any service contract. The response was quick, and the quality of service was very high. I got the patches I wanted very quickly without paying a cent! It was really a good experience.

    3. Re:Interesting.... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Nope.. Fixes for security vulnerabilities are ALWAYS free from cisco.. regardless of your contract status.

    4. Re:Interesting.... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      If by really good experience you mean this sucks, then ya I agree! :)

  47. Who needs sleep? by yatalung · · Score: 0


    Remember, if the spoon doesn't dissolve, it ain't coffee.

  48. No Exploits? by grimani · · Score: 4, Insightful

    What does "no exploits" mean?

    No script kiddy tool for it yet?
    Nobody's used it yet to take down routers?

    Because the security advisory sure sounds like it's discovered an "exploit" on Cisco IOS routers to me.

    Any self respecting coder can whip up something homemade to take advantage of the issue.

    Is "no exploits" yet supposed to make us feel safer?

    If a security hole is there, it's vulnerable. Calling it "unexploited for now" is just misleading and confusing.

    1. Re:No Exploits? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I wouldn't be so quick to say that "Any self respecting coder can whip up something homemade to take advantage of the issue." If that were the case, then there probably would be an exploit by now.

      From the security advisory -

      'A rare, specially crafted sequence of IPv4 packets which is handled by the processor on a Cisco IOS device may force the device to incorrectly flag the input queue on an interface as full, which will cause the router to stop processing inbound traffic on that interface.'

      I'd say it's pretty much standard practice to point out wether it's just a vulnerability, or one for which an exploit has been found.

    2. Re:No Exploits? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Hey, this flaw is in the IOS since around 1994,
      so don't panic.

      Most of the problems will be caused by people messing up their upgrades...

    3. Re:No Exploits? by krinsh · · Score: 1

      A 'vulnerability' has been found. When they say 'no exploits', that means that no one has written code/an automated tool/etc. for 'exploit code' to be dropped into and launched to actually cause the damage. 'Exploit code', of course, being a hypothetical or actual module that will break the system. [Sometimes people write a few lines of 'example code' that they have not actually used to exploit the vulnerability, thus I use hypothetical.] I am not an expert, but I've got a little experience with this stuff now.

      --
      I think with the interesting people, their lives can't possibly be wrapped up into a nice little package.
  49. Insightful my ass by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Unlearned moron,

    The free flow of data through routers is analagous to the free flow of capital between economies. The US government can't strategically blow dink lint with a DoS that SHUTS DOWN that flow, cloying bugeois diaper fart.

    Perhaps you VAT taxing imbeciles should realize that the only thing your inbred, cloistered behaviour accomplishes is driving your best & brightest to our sunny shores, where they hatch Sparkling, New and Improved Schemes for hijacking your data assets.

    Peace, love, tranquility...
    and All your routers are belong to us! Hehehe...

    Please go form a union of food trough wipers to further indebt your spawn to Shiney and Magnificent levels of ingratitude, and spare us the weekend excitement of blowing your countrymen to smithereens. It's depressing, the people and assets we waste on your non-voluntary radical post-birth control.

    1. Re:Insightful my ass by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0
      "The free flow of data through routers is analagous to the free flow of capital between economies. The US government can't strategically blow dink lint with a DoS that SHUTS DOWN that flow, cloying bugeois diaper fart"


      Hey smartypants, what's this got to do with sendmail?

  50. TCP port 659.. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    ..addressed to the router ifc.

    'tis my guess.

    http://www.cisco.com/univercd/cc/td/doc/product/ so ftware/ios121/121newft/121t/121t5/dtssm5t.htm#1021 424

    1. Re:TCP port 659.. by MadHungarian1917 · · Score: 1

      As Spock would say Fascinating the link is no longer there on CCO

    2. Re:TCP port 659.. by George+D.+Malone · · Score: 1

      Nope....
      his link is just badly formatted...a /. issue I assume (as it is happening to me too!)
      The link is still there...
      link - http://www.cisco.com/univercd/cc/td/doc/product/so ftware/ios121/121newft/121t/121t5/dtssm5t.htm#1021 424

  51. That would explain this e-mail. by ryanisflyboy · · Score: 1, Funny

    ------- Sent to ValueWeb customers -------
    ValueWeb has been informed by a number
    of our bandwidth providers (MCI, Sprint, and
    Level 3) that they will be undergoing maintenance
    that may cause widespread Internet slowness
    between 3:00 and 6:00 am EST, July 17th, 2003

  52. iswest.com had an outage yesterday afternoon by nethole · · Score: 0

    I have a machine colocated at iswest.com in Ventura county. My machine, and their webserver (www.iswest.com) disappeared for 10 minutes yesterday. Of course, calling their support number was useless (Tier 1 folks, of course).

    I don't know if this outage was related to the cisco, issue, but its just another data point.

  53. ISP going down by MC68040 · · Score: 1

    Well I guess this is why my isp has died twice today... Luckily they have junipers on their overseas links...

  54. no known exploit... well not really. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    It's a bit frustrating but from the reading it looks like a bug that was reported to Cisco in 2000. The fact that it's taken more than three year to fix is frankly appalling.

    1. Re:no known exploit... well not really. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      And it may have been reported internally even earlier. However, CSCO's PHBs do not respond with any urgency to problems reported by their staff. It takes a major customer outage to get them to authorize spending time to fix "potential" problems.

  55. homogeneous networks by martin · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Now let us step back a little.

    IF this had happened to our friends at Redmond (what do you mean 'if' :-) then we'd all be crying about how homogeneous networks/OS's etc are bad for security.

    Now it's happened to a vendor with probably more pieces of kit attached to the public internet than anyone else (by a long chalk IMHO).

    Do we cry, bad Cisco bad, no we just look at all the poor network admins who will get no sleep for the next 2 days....

    Perhaps NOW people wil start looking at alternatives to Cisco.

    Don't get me wrong I love Cisco kit, but I think the risk of Cisco everywhere is just about to hit home...

    1. Re:homogeneous networks by Pvt_Waldo · · Score: 1

      Hear hear.

      If the network hardware would say to you, "Hey I had a flaw, but already downloaded the patch for it. Want me to install it?" like Windows does, this wouldn't be so bad.

      Seriously - Microsoft's auto-update system for Windows is fantastic. I get the patch for a bug before I see it on /., and before my sys admin people even have sent out the mass mail to everyone notifying us there's a new patch. It's fantastic, painless, and it works - well.

    2. Re:homogeneous networks by martin · · Score: 1

      for 'home' users may the auto update thing is good, but given the poor quality of MS-updates for servers (Service packs, patches etc) I'd rather it not do it for critical stuff like core servers without running through a test system.

    3. Re:homogeneous networks by Wiseazz · · Score: 1

      I have mixed results with the auto-update. Generally speaking, I usually get better results by going directly to windowsupdate

      But maybe I'm stupid :) Go figure.

      --
      My sig sucks.
  56. What about PIX firewalls? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0
    Can anyone say if Cisco PIX firewalls are vulnerable? I think they run a subset of the IOS software.
    pix515> sh ver

    Cisco PIX Firewall Version 6.1(4)
    Cisco PIX Device Manager Version 1.1(2)

    Compiled on Tue 21-May-02 08:40 by morlee

    pix515 up 238 days 11 hours

    Hardware: PIX-515E, 32 MB RAM, CPU Pentium II 433 MHz
    Flash E28F128J3 @ 0x300, 16MB
    BIOS Flash AM29F400B @ 0xfffd8000, 32KB

    1. Re:What about PIX firewalls? by MadHungarian1917 · · Score: 2, Informative

      PIX Firewalls actually run a OS called Finesse. It used to look a lot less IOS like than it does today. They do not appear to be vulnerable at this time

    2. Re:What about PIX firewalls? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      thought that pixen ran vxworks?

  57. Figures by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    It figures:

    >sh ver ...
    [...] uptime is 1 year, 11 hours, 3 minutes

  58. Re:I don't want to start a holy war by Zeriel · · Score: 0

    Okay, I seem to be the only one who thinks this is a relatively masterful adaptation of the original Mac-vs.-WinNT post.

    Props for being a clever, funny troll. Now write more original stuff.

    --
    "America has done some terrible things. But I know that Americans don't cheer when innocents die." -Dave Barry
  59. Exploit Detection by ZaphodBeeblebroxs · · Score: 1

    OK. So we know that it's an IPv4 packet that is sent to the router, and that's it? Is there any way we can detect hacker attempts to exploit this bug.

    If there _is_ an exploit out there, I for one would like to know if they're trying it on.
    That is without dropping a Cisco router at my front door and waiting for it to get shot!
    (Which would be a little dropping your daks at a Lorena Bobbit convention, and hoping no-one brought the garden shears with them!).

    1. Re:Exploit Detection by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Well, if somebody send an IP packet to your router, he is maybe an EVIL HaX0reZ!!!

      OK, let's be serious: keeping the details of the vulnerability undisclosed is the best way to keep your network safe.
      With more details published in the advisory, you would have seen an exploit within the hour!

  60. I've seen this by Spazmania · · Score: 1

    I have seen this behavior on several of my systems on interfaces where I *know* the customer is not intentionally sending bad packets. I resolved the problem by disabling fair-queueing on the interfaces where this tended to happen.

    --
    Moderating "-1, Disagree" is simple censorship. Have the guts to post your opinion.
  61. Govermental problems? by Seydlitz · · Score: 2, Interesting

    (For Americans and others; the NHS is a country wide health service that treats everyone. It's on a WAN, called NHSnet. For that reason, any netowrk problems are very serious, as it means hospitals are almost totally unable to function.(for the record, internal IP's start with 10.1.xxx))

    Toured a local NHS facility yesterday, when they were recovering from a total internal crash that cut off all internal network traffic, as well as external traffic in and out.

    The crash was caused by a halt in network traffic(read: router failure) in which the error messages overwelmed the servers. (that was the reason I was given, at least... but I can't really belive that the servers would be that badly configured.)

    The servers, for the record, are a mixture of VMS (insert unix plug here) and NT/2000's (insert windows flame here). (There's a effort to move them over to pure Windows... goverments. bah.)

    Anyhoo, the upshot of all this was that the routers had to be restarted and the server's hard disks to be remerged...

    Guess who's routers they were? Cisco.

    This was before or shortly after the release of the warning... could the problem be a bit more serious than previously thought?

    1. Re:Govermental problems? by u38cg · · Score: 1
      I can't really belive that the servers would be that badly configured.

      I believe the NHS's IT is run by Crapita. an extremely poor provider of ITC "solutions". Private Eye has been banging on about them since time began, but the upshot is I can very easily believe they were that badly configured.

      --
      [FUCK BETA]
  62. Cisco Delightfully Responsive by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Having 7 affected devices on my network and no formal support, I had visions of dread when I read this notice at 7:30am.

    By 8am, I had my request to tac@cisco.com, by 9am, I received a call from the Cisco SE letting me know a reply email with the required access information needed to upgrade the IOS images had been sent. By 9:40am, all seven devices were updated.

    Considering the bulk of these devices are (comparatively) inexpensive 2950-series switches and no formal support contracts, I'm thoroughly impressed by Cisco's behavior. Heck, the Cisco SE even emailed me around 9:30am to see if I had any problems flashing the devices or if I needed further assistance!

    -AC

    1. Re:Cisco Delightfully Responsive by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Heck, they've only been pushing "5 nines" internally for three-four years now. Things like this take time. I'm sure that they still are resistant to memory leak analyzers and other proper software quality evaulation tools. I should know, it took seven plus years to convince management that global variables are bad and even still many remain extant because they assigned the task to pinheaded imported coders.

  63. On the cisco.com site.... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    the news headline is:

    Top Story
    17 JUL 2003
    Vietnam Aims to Play a Big Part in Asia's Technology Future

  64. Irony in the ad at the top of this Slashdot page.. by Ocelot+Wreak · · Score: 1
    Ironically, the ad at the top of this Slashdot page that I'm viewing is:

    Up to 85% off Cisco 2501
    Save on Used Cisco Equipment Routers, Gbics, Modules & more.
    www.bizinetworks.com


    Used Cisco Routers
    Used/Refurbished Cisco Routers save up to 90% off retail price.
    www.networkliquidators.com


    Cisco Switches
    Compare Prices and Save Money. Find the best deals at BizRate.com!
    www.BizRate.com

    *Ahem*! -Ocelot Wreak.

    --
    "I figure you're here 'cause you need some whacko who's willing to stick his finger in the fan. So who are we helping?
  65. The Sky is Falling!!! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Dammit, just when I thought my system was safe with the super secure, exploit free Windows 2000 Server. My CISCO IOS may have an exploit. I might as well p2p network under windows 98 with print and file sharing turned on.

  66. 7200 Series Only! by NormanICE · · Score: 1, Troll

    The title of the document states, and I quote "Cicso 7200 Series Routers..."

    The problem only occurs in the 7200 series router!

    1. Re:7200 Series Only! by ZaphodBeeblebroxs · · Score: 1

      To Quote the advisory from Cisco -:

      Affected Products

      This issue affects all Cisco devices running Cisco IOS software and configured to process Internet Protocol version 4 (IPv4) packets. Cisco devices which do not run Cisco IOS software are not affected. Devices which run only Internet Protocol version 6 (IPv6) are not affected.

    2. Re:7200 Series Only! by YetAnotherDave · · Score: 2, Informative
      Um, I beg to differ. The title seems pretty misleading, if you actually read the text...

      Affected Products This issue affects all Cisco devices running Cisco IOS software and configured to process Internet Protocol version 4 (IPv4) packets. Cisco devices which do not run Cisco IOS software are not affected. Devices which run only Internet Protocol version 6 (IPv6) are not affected.

      Tho I realy wish you were correct, since none of the (many) cisco devices in my net are 7200s...

    3. Re:7200 Series Only! by Colorful+Numbers · · Score: 1
      I agree that this is weird. From the "Affected Products" section of the advisory:
      This issue affects all Cisco devices running Cisco IOS software and configured to process Internet Protocol version 4 (IPv4) packets. Cisco devices which do not run Cisco IOS software are not affected. Devices which run only Internet Protocol version 6 (IPv6) are not affected.
      And fron the "details" section:
      The following two Cisco vulnerabilities are documented in DDTS. CSCea02355 (registered customers only) affects all Cisco routers running Cisco IOS software. CSCdz71127 (registered customers only) was introduced by an earlier code revision. Any version of software which has the fix for CSCdx02283 (registered customers only) is vulnerable.
      The title and the body don't seem to agree. Maybe they meant that all 7200's running IOS are affected, but it certainly doesn't read that way. I'm going to be pessimistic and assume the advisory has a misleading title.
    4. Re:7200 Series Only! by JesterOne · · Score: 1

      I think Norman may be right... I can't find the same security advisory for the 2600 series routers. I think the way the advisory reads applies to the 7200 series...

  67. Not if you're using anything less than a 72xx! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Interesting

    Cisco routers are notoriously underpowered! Install some ACLs on a busy 3600 or 2600 series router and you'll start a DOS attack on your own router!

    As this recent NetworkWorldFusion review shows, a 2651 starts to fall apart with 8 rules on only 2 T1s!

    I would definitely NOT recommend adding ACLs willy-nilly to Cisco routers. BE CAREFUL and add a couple at a time during peak traffic times to make sure the router stays up.

    And (experience talking here) be sure you're logged in on console and not telnetted into the Cisco when adding a bunch of ACLs. Your telnet session will not get priority over forwarded packets and you'll have no control over the router!

    Cisco wants you to think ACLs are only "waaafer theeen"!

    1. Re:Not if you're using anything less than a 72xx! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Cisco fans always tell you the router is soooo much more powerful than your PC, but I'm sure a PC of today (Say a P4 at 2.5 GHz) with a couple of decent network cards will outperform any Cisco of the 2600 or 3600 series.
      It will not even need any "coprocessor card" to do 3DES or compression.

    2. Re:Not if you're using anything less than a 72xx! by sn00ker · · Score: 1

      Yeah, your PC will piss all over anything less than a 72xx. However, your PC will also take many times longer to boot, consumes considerably more rack space and power, and has that most evil of sins: Moving parts.
      Of course, if you were to use one of those funky flash IDE drives you could do the whole thing without an HDD and then you'd be talking negligible power consumption and no moving parts. You still lose on the rack space thing, though.

      --
      "God, root, what is difference?" - Pitr, userfriendly
    3. Re:Not if you're using anything less than a 72xx! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      >However, your PC will also take many times longer to boot

      NOT TRUE AT ALL! A modern PC boots a lot faster than a 3725 or 1721.

      >consumes considerably more rack space and power

      Not really. Maybe a little more.

      >and has that most evil of sins: Moving parts

      I'll advise you to look again at the current state of the art in PCs.

    4. Re:Not if you're using anything less than a 72xx! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      i suppose a Chan. T3 card for your PC costs $130 used too huh?

  68. ACLs on the GSR (was Re:duh) by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    I'd encourage you to read up on rACLs.
    Of course, if you actually administered a GSR, instead of speculating, you probably already knew this.

  69. the problem with that thinking by Artifex · · Score: 1
    Yeah you would think more people would be using Juniper routers


    Oh, Juniper makes great routers, but they're all carrier (ISP) class, or at least they all were when I trained on them. You're not going to find them used as customer CPE very often... and individual companies have the most to lose by this exploit, especially small ones whose ISPs maintain their equipment for them, who aren't rolling out fixes for all those small Ciscos now.

    --
    Get off my launchpad!
  70. Reade the rest of hte article by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Since you only like to read the Subject, I won't add anything more here.

  71. Amazing by grayantimatter · · Score: 3, Interesting

    I think it's amazing how so many people posting here want to assume/believe that ANY slight hiccup on ANY network ANYWHERE in the last week is a direct result of this issue.

  72. i first heard... by Tancred · · Score: 1

    ...something was up at lunch on Tuesday. Our Cisco SE said he couldn't say what it was until 5pm that day. Apparently about 20-30 big networks were contacted then and only a few (100) people at Cisco itself knew.

  73. Soapbox by JamesR2 · · Score: 1

    So much for appliances ... plug 'em in and leave 'em? NOT! Tripping off soapbox now ...

  74. Horrible! by coene · · Score: 1

    I think they should upgrade my IOS version out of good faith ;)

  75. And while you are at it... by eyeareque · · Score: 1

    While you are out there drinking your redbull and upgrading IOS on every Cisco router you own... Don't forget to upgrade all of your switches too...Read this http://www.packetstormsecurity.nl/filedesc/ciscoCa tOS.txt.html

    Way to Go cisco.... How's that for the five nines.

    NOTE: Juniper testing will be starting very soon at my job >:)

    1. Re:And while you are at it... by Limax+Maximus · · Score: 1

      Of course as we are all good network administrators we'll have all the management addresses of our switchs on a separate vlan which is restricted access to only network management stations. Likewise with routers, blocking direct access to all the interfaces except your management interface (which is from a serial switch). I mean how brain dead do you need to be not to do this?

      Now where did I hide the crate of redbull and list of routers...

    2. Re:And while you are at it... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      More like nine fives.

    3. Re:And while you are at it... by eyeareque · · Score: 1

      hopefully your vlans are physically separate ethernet segments.. cus god knows cisco acls are the worst way to secure a box. a simple test with hping2 generated traffic can prove my claims.

  76. Dagda? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Dagda? Is that you?

  77. parent post... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    ...highlights the need for a (+1: Chilling) moderation.

  78. Thank God it's only those routers that use IOS by multiplexo · · Score: 1

    and route IPv4. Otherwise we'd be screwed.

    --
    cheap labor conservatives - they want to keep you hungry enough to be thankful for minimum wage.
  79. Cisco did indeed warn large providers ahead of tim by The+AtomicPunk · · Score: 1

    From: Hembree, Daniel [mailto:Daniel.Hembree@Level3.com]
    Sent: Thursday, July 17, 2003 10:39 AM
    To: undisclosed-recipients
    Subject: Level(3)

    ________________________________________________ __ _________________
    As you may be aware, Level 3 performed significant maintenance to Cisco
    routers in our Network over the past two evenings. Due to restrictions in
    our contract with Cisco, we were not at liberty to share with you the nature
    or details of the pending work. Additional information can now be shared.
    Level 3 Communications was notified by Cisco on the evening of Tuesday, July
    15, of a potential software risk running on Cisco routers. In coordination
    with Cisco, Level 3 Engineers worked to secure the Level 3 Network through
    network modifications and router maintenance that evening. The remainder of
    our core Network infrastructure was completed in the maintenance window last
    evening.
    We recognize that the timeframe and notification provided in this case have
    not been consistent with standard practice. The decision to move forward
    with work was based on a collective assessment of the potential impacts to
    your services if the risk was not mitigated.
    We will continue to conduct maintenance activities over the coming days as
    we address issues associated with this specific exposure, and mitigate any
    potential remaining risk. We will provide specific maintenance notifications
    to Customers on the associated services we would impact in those follow-on
    maintenance activities.
    For more information regarding the vulnerability please visit:

  80. More details by Jack+Greenbaum · · Score: 1
    From the cisco security announcement:
    A rare, specially crafted sequence of IPv4 packets with protocol type 53 (SWIPE), 55 (IP Mobility), 77 (Sun ND), or 103 (Protocol Independent Multicast - PIM) which is handled by the processor on a Cisco IOS device may force the device to incorrectly flag the input queue on an interface as full, which will cause the router to stop processing inbound traffic on that interface.

    -- Jack

  81. Re:Cisco sucks by pair-a-noyd · · Score: 1

    Flamebait maybe, absolute fact (cisco sucks), yes...

  82. Re:I don't want to start a holy war by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Ever heard of multi layer switching, RSMs, or MSFCs? You god damn CCNA bootcamp dipshit!

  83. Cisco has updated the advisory to include details by ckan · · Score: 1

    Just Received the following message from incidents@securityfocus.com mailing list:

    " Cisco has updated the advisory to include details on the exploit.

    http://www.cisco.com/warp/public/707/cisco-sa-2003 0717-blocked.shtml

    Cisco routers are configured to process and accept Internet Protocol version 4 (IPv4) packets by default. A rare, specially crafted sequence of IPv4 packets with protocol type 53 (SWIPE), 55 (IP Mobility), 77 (Sun ND), or 103 (Protocol Independent Multicast - PIM) which is handled by the processor on a Cisco IOS device may force the device to incorrectly flag the input queue on an interface as full, which will cause the router to stop processing inbound traffic on that interface. This can cause routing protocols to drop due to dead timers.
    "

  84. Yet by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Exploit code was finalized by a 3rd party, 20 minutes after the advisory was posted.

  85. Re:It only took me a few hours by Syndelor · · Score: 1

    After hearing the sploit it only took me a couple hours to get the code.... Some real Geniouses out there so I will take Saturday before it is ported to windows for the script kidddddies

  86. Re:Irony in the ad at the top of this Slashdot pag by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    No, that is not irony, it is a coincidence.