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Windows 2003 and XP SP2 Vulnerable To LAND Attack

An anonymous reader writes "Dejan Levaja, a Serbian security engineer has discovered that nearly 8 years after the attack was first made public, WIndows 2003 and Windows XP SP2 are in fact vulnerable to the historic LAND attack." Granted, you need to have the firewall turned off for this work, but there's a whole lotta machines that don't have it turned on.

70 of 534 comments (clear)

  1. Only win ? by mirko · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Are only Windows platform vulnerable or will these attacks be successful on other non-ms platforms ?

    --
    Trolling using another account since 2005.
    1. Re:Only win ? by redJag · · Score: 5, Informative

      There is a big list before the provided source code.

    2. Re:Only win ? by swillden · · Score: 3, Funny

      Since that site appears to be slashdotted, google turned up another one..

      Might as well take down both of them, right?

      --
      Note to ACs: I usually delete AC replies without reading them. If you want to talk to me, log in.
    3. Re:Only win ? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

      OS X is invulnerable to all attacks, because it's made of magic.

    4. Re:Only win ? by AKnightCowboy · · Score: 5, Funny
      OS X is invulnerable to all attacks, because it's made of magic.

      *snort*. You owe me a new keyboard.

      /Mac user

    5. Re:Only win ? by ip_fired · · Score: 3, Interesting

      I compiled land.c on linux and and then had it test my powerbook (OS X.3.8) on an open port. Nothing happened, thus it's not exploitable.

      If anyone is interested, I had to modify the program to get it to work in linux (the structures have changed since this was originally written).

      Here is a patch so you can test other OSes.

      land.diff

      Curse you slashcode! It won't let me inline the patch. Oh well. Download it if you want it.

      --
      Don't count your messages before they ACK.
    6. Re:Only win ? by ip_fired · · Score: 4, Informative

      I found some interesting things while playing around with this.

      1st: The checksum code is always off by 3 in that file. Subtract 3 from the value before you take the complement and it'll be right. (this is a kludge, I haven't taken the time to actually figure out why it's wrong yet)

      2nd: It causes 100% CPU usage on a WinXP SP2 box for about 3 seconds for each packet sent!!!

      3rd: It can be blocked (and probably IS blocked) by most routers since the source and destination addresses are the same.

      I got permission to send one of these packets to my friends Win2003 box and as far as we can tell, it didn't do anything. I don't know if the packet is getting through though.

      4th: Also, I retested the Mac, and again, the malformed packet did nothing.

      --
      Don't count your messages before they ACK.
  2. Little known fact by beatdown · · Score: 5, Funny

    It is also subject to sea and air attacks.

    1. Re:Little known fact by spektr · · Score: 4, Funny

      True, the US Navy use Windows don't they?

      They had put it on an aircraft carrier and navigated it away from shore immediately, when they heard about the LAND exploit. To their delight, it stayed pretty stable in the middle of the sea.

    2. Re:Little known fact by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

      The Navy usually makes sure its ports are secure.

    3. Re:Little known fact by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

      Yes, but they call them "port holes".

    4. Re:Little known fact by jd · · Score: 4, Interesting
      This is probably going to crack you up. Yes, they do. For secure communications, application serving, and (for the "intelligent" ships) navigation systems.


      There are people in the US Navy who are actively interested in Linux, but they are heavily outnumbered by fans of Windows and SCO Unix.

      --
      It's a small world and it smells funny; I'd buy another if it wasn't for the money; Take back what I paid (SoM)
    5. Re:Little known fact by darkpixel2k · · Score: 5, Funny

      Well...usually.

      There was this one time...in Hawaii...

      --
      There's no place like ::1 (I've completed my transition to IPv6)
    6. Re:Little known fact by harrkev · · Score: 5, Funny

      According to the Village People, the Navy usually has some back doors.

      --
      "-1 Troll" is the apparently the same as "-1 I disagree with you."
  3. wow by Quasar1999 · · Score: 5, Funny

    In other news, my computer is also prone to failing if I microwave it... hit it with a hammer, or attempt to install water cooling while I'm drunk...

    --

    ---
    Programming is like sex... Make one mistake and support it the rest of your life.
    1. Re:wow by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

      Problem:
      The other thing Microsoft won't tell you is that if paramilitants do a home invasion, they can take your machine right out of the house and have access to all data and the entire network, for that matter.

      Solution: Install complex home alarm system, man traps, CCTV, and acquire armed guards, string up razor wire and dig tunnel system deep in the jungle.

      Ethic:
      I told microsoft that their computers were totally unprotected from physical theft by armed gangs of paramilitants and received no response. I am now sharing this with the community.

    2. Re:wow by Tassach · · Score: 4, Insightful
      There is NO legitimate reason whatsoever for a modern, patched operating system to be vulnerable to a simple, 8-year-old DOS attack. What's next, reintroduction of the Ping Of Death vulnerability? This is sloppy quality control, pure and simple.

      This incident is just another example which demonstrates the importance (or more accurately, the lack thereof) that Microsoft's corporate culture places on security. Hasn't anyone at Microsoft ever heard about regression testing?

      Microsoft has consistantly demonstrated that, regardless of what their press releases say, security is NOT one of their priorities. People need to start waking up and realizing this before they entrust their critical infrastructure to Microsoft products.

      --
      Why is it that the proponents of "one nation under God" are so eager to get rid of "liberty and justice for all"?
    3. Re:wow by log0n · · Score: 3, Funny

      Personally, I'm hoping WinNuke make a comeback.

    4. Re:wow by Maestro4k · · Score: 4, Interesting
      but the reality is this vulnerability happened after SP2 was released.
      • Actually no, this vulnerability showed up 8 years ago and was patched in Windows 98 I believe. So this isn't something new that Microsoft is just now learning about and need to fix, it's something quite old. Since the vulnerability came out ME, 2000 and XP all were released.
      Perhaps they setup a firewall to allow them to fix things underneath without totally destroying everyone's networks?
      • If you're trying to say that MS feels that having the firewall on by default in XP SP2 is a shortcut for fixing problems, well, I certainly HOPE they're not taking that attitude. Yes the firewall needs to be on by default for better security, but they should have tested the OS against
      • known vulnerabilities with the firewall off to be certain they wouldn't work. Failure to do so shows some serious problems in MS land.
      When you have as large of an installbase as MS does you can't shift things right away or you will lose customers, you have to make changes slowly and incrimentally so that users don't get confused.
      • You seem royally confused about what this actually is. Land is a DOS attack that is caused by sending a SYN packet to an open port on a machine with the source and destination addresses the same. This isn't something that is _needed_ by any app, it's a TCP/IP oddity, a packet that would normally never occur. Back 8 years ago it was understandable that MS and others didn't anticipate this attack, but after 8 years there's not any excuse.
      • Simply this is not something users are going to notice the lack of. They'll certainly notice it's there if their machines gets hit with a Land attack though. It is NOT a case of MS trying to make changes slowly to not confuse customers, it's a big blunder.

      MS has been working a lot on connectivity over the last year or so with some protocol enhancements and increased IPv6 support. I imagine things are going to get worse before they get better, but don't kid yourself, they are working on fixing it.
      • Frankly if their "working on fixing it" involves re-introducing exploits first identified and fixed 8 YEARS ago then I'm certainly not going to hold my breath that they'll ever fix anything.
      • Ultimately though your defense of MS is unwarranted. They publically declared a while back (1-2 years now I think) that security was going to be a primary focus for them. This was pre-SP2 days. That they re-introduced a vulnerability from eight years ago speaks great volumes about that focus. If MS wants to claim they're security-focused now they deserve the lumps they get for foolish mistakes like this.

  4. News? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

    "Granted, you need to have the firewall turned off for this work, but there's a whole lotta machines that don't have it turned on."

    Machines that are not protected are vulnerable. Well, that isn't really news is it? Sounds pretty silly to me.

    1. Re:News? by A+beautiful+mind · · Score: 4, Insightful

      You forgot something:

      A box running no services should be not vulnerable of any dos except brute force even without a firewall. A firewall shouldn't be a solution to poor design/implementation problems and code bugs. That is simply not working. What if someone gets through the firewall?

      --
      It takes a man to suffer ignorance and smile
      Be yourself no matter what they say
    2. Re:News? by BorgDrone · · Score: 3, Insightful
      "Machines that are not protected are vulnerable. Well, that isn't really news is it?"
      A firewall is an additional level of security, a system should be save without it.
    3. Re:News? by InsaneGeek · · Score: 4, Informative

      The LAND attack requires an open port, so by definition if the system isn't running any services it will have no open ports and not be vulnerable to this attack.

    4. Re:News? by JustForMe · · Score: 5, Funny

      Windows Server must be running some services, I guess..

    5. Re:News? by fsck! · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Generally speaking, just about any Windows instance is going to gave at lease these ports open:

      Starting nmap 3.75 ( http://www.insecure.org/nmap/ ) at 2005-03-07 11:45 EST
      (The 1659 ports scanned but not shown below are in state: closed)
      PORT STATE SERVICE
      135/tcp open msrpc
      139/tcp open netbios-ssn
      445/tcp open microsoft-ds

      So this could reak havoc on business or residential networks. But then, I guess this is what you get for giving your users or peers an inapropriate level of trust.

    6. Re:News? by PyWiz · · Score: 3, Interesting

      Well, sure, as many people have pointed out, by disabling your firewall you are leaving yourself open to attacks. In addition, the LAND attack is merely a DOS attack and thus does not pose much threat to home computers (and servers would have firewalls).

      However, that is far from the point. The point is that 8 years after an attack was discovered, Microsofts commercial OS was STILL vulnerable to it. Obviously, if they're leaving themselves open to such vintage attacks as LAND, their security testing processes can't be all that great can they? What's there to assure us another more dangerous attack won't be discovered in the near future?

      At least in my opinion, this is yet another argument for open source. The MS developers that worked on this part of the code probably just threw some old stuff together and called it a day. The module was probably review by few other people and thus such an obvious vulnerabilty was released in the final product. With an open source product like Linux, this kind of stuff rarely if ever happens. So many people are scrutinizing the code that the chances of an obvious vuln going unnoticed are next to nothing.

      I guess what I'm saying is, before you leave your critical data to a company propogating closed source products like MS, you should at least make sure they have their proverbial shit together first.

      -py

      --
      -py
  5. Windows by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

    Only one remote hole in the kernel FOR eight years!

  6. Wait... by Gorffy · · Score: 5, Funny

    You mean to tell me that XP and 2k3 contain buggy legacy code? that IS news!

  7. What kind of software dev process do MS use? by Ex+Machina · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Isn't this EXACTLY what regression tests were designed for?

    1. Re:What kind of software dev process do MS use? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

      Regression testing makes sure that things that used to work in the old version still works in the new version, so I'd say that windows is passing its regression tests with flying colors ;)

    2. Re:What kind of software dev process do MS use? by KDN · · Score: 5, Interesting
      Several jobs ago, the I did software development. The manager didn't like how every time I found a significant bug I added it to a test library that I kept and ran against every version of the code that I was about to put out to the group. His thought was "the odds of someone making the same mistake twice are non existent". One time he told me to put the code out before it was done the regression tests. Sure enough, crash and burn. And yes, my regression tests later caught the bug. Never again.

      As a further indication that I was right, I put an interface around the public interface of my libraries to validate all the parameters and actions. I noticed some people would make the same error so much that I even personalized some of the error messages. Like: "Your passing a string instead of an address John", and "Your reading from a closed object Kevin".

    3. Re:What kind of software dev process do MS use? by jd · · Score: 3, Funny
      Hey, give Microsoft a chance! Windows is regressing as fast as it can! :)


      Oh, regression tests! Those things! Bill Gates thought they were just funny-looking packing peanuts and threw them out.

      --
      It's a small world and it smells funny; I'd buy another if it wasn't for the money; Take back what I paid (SoM)
    4. Re:What kind of software dev process do MS use? by Phanatic1a · · Score: 5, Funny

      Or even "You're not using contractions properly, KDN"?

    5. Re:What kind of software dev process do MS use? by XorNand · · Score: 3, Informative

      Yeah, that's the Simple File Sharing "feature" of XP Home Edition. Enabled by default, it can be annoying if you're used to doing things the "old way" (user friendly, but expert hostile). Just use this KB article to turn it off.

      --
      Entrepreneur : (noun), French for "unemployed"
  8. Only one thing though... by MtViewGuy · · Score: 4, Insightful
    Granted, you need to have the firewall turned off for this work, but there's a whole lotta machines that don't have it turned on.

    ...Isn't the Internet Connection Firewall that comes with Windows XP SP2 turned on by default when you install it in the first place?

    Anyway, given all the warnings about Internet security in the last five years, the majority of users will already have downloaded and installed firewall programs such as ZoneAlarm.

    1. Re:Only one thing though... by eviltypeguy · · Score: 5, Insightful

      If you think the majority of users are security minded like that, then why do you think the majority of users have so many problems that could be prevented in the first place by firewalls? Sorry, but my experience has been the opposite of your fairy tale.

  9. Windows running slow? by hackwrench · · Score: 5, Funny

    It may be a little thing called a firewall. A firewall is a spyware-like little piece of software that constantly pings a special server called a firedoor so that spammers hackers, and their ilk know when your computer is available on the internet. Unfortuntely Microsoft refuses to release a patch for this thing but a piece of software called a backdoor can be used to prevent the firewall from doing its dirty work. Download one today!

  10. Guess we need Boston Church XP by kakos · · Score: 5, Funny

    01 if by LAND, 10 if by SEA

    1. Re:Guess we need Boston Church XP by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Funny

      I thought it was 1 if by LAN, 2 if by C:

  11. On a more serious note.. by tabkey12 · · Score: 5, Interesting
    Blanket Attacks (like blaster, where every windows computer on the net with windows sharing on is hit about 6 times an hour) are usually only viable when the Default configuration is insecure.

    At least with SP2 there is some basic security in terms of the firewall being on by default.

    Still, never thought I'd see a slashdot article linking to a page about Trumpet Winsock in 2005!

  12. Safest OS by Virtual+Karma · · Score: 5, Funny

    Windows is one of the safest OS around (and to keep it that way it is advised that the computer should not be connected to internet or any other network for that matter)

  13. Microsoft Notified by Nom+du+Keyboard · · Score: 4, Funny
    Ethic:
    Microsoft was informed 7 days ago (25.02.2005, GMT +1, local time), NO answer received, so I decided to share this info with security community.

    Of course they didn't reply. They're under LAND attack, and your message is caught in the server. You must have sent them a proof-of-concept, so what did you expect?

    --
    "It's the height of ridiculousness to say for those 9 lines you get hundreds of millions."
  14. What is the LAND attack? by fizbin · · Score: 5, Informative
    Quoting from http://www.insecure.org/sploits/land.ip.DOS.html:
    i recently discovered a bug which freezes win95 boxes. here's how
    it works: send a spoofed packet with the SYN flag set from a host, on an open
    port (such as 113 or 139), setting as source the SAME host and port
    (ie: 10.0.0.1:139 to 10.0.0.1:139). this will cause the win95 machine to lock
    up.
    So it's a way to either remotely lock up or reboot a target machine. I would assume (not having, you know, tried it or anything) that this includes most windows-based webservers.
  15. Open ports by ca1v1n · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Of course, some windows machines need to have open ports, like, say, if they're offering *services*. So really, your mundane desktop need not be affected. It's the production server you should be quite terrified about.

  16. Can anyone confirm? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Interesting

    A friend showed this to me a few days ago and I was unable to reproduce the attack over the LAN, both with my own code and some code of the original LAND found with google. Both were run from linux by opening a raw socket, filling in ip and tcp headers including checksums using the structs in ip.h and tcp.h, and sending with sendto(). In both cases ethereal would show the packet as recieved but the machine would operate normally.

    1. Re:Can anyone confirm? by bluelip · · Score: 4, Informative

      The problem might be w/ your code.

      A test listed in an above comment of mine worked for my box. DL hping2 and try:

      hping2 aaa.bbb.ccc.ddd -s 135 -p 135 -S -a aaa.bbb.ccc.ddd

      Obviously, replace aaa.bbb.ccc.ddd w/ the ip address of the workstation you'd like to test

      --

      Yep, I never spell check.
      More incorrect spellings can be found he
  17. Oh c'mon, that isn't fair. by Billy+Bo+Bob · · Score: 4, Funny

    8 years is hardly enough to figure out how to patch windows.

    Besides, like all everyone here says, it is the users own fault for not using a firewall. Having an expectation that 8 yr old attacks should be fixed is just unreasonable.

    WTF, are you all on crack?

  18. Retro! by bigtallmofo · · Score: 5, Funny

    I remember the days of Ping of Death, Land, Teardrop, New Tear, Bork, etc.

    Now that my WinXP SP2 system is susceptible to land again, it's getting me into a nostalgic mood. I think I'll go play Ms PacMan on my MAME cabinet now.

    --
    I'm a big tall mofo.
  19. Am I vulnerable? by SteelV · · Score: 3, Interesting

    I have yet to install SP2 because I heard it hurts performance of some computer games, which is mainly what I use my windows PC for.

    I am otherwise up-to-date with windows updates. I have a linksys router for my internet connection, but no software firewall.

    Am I vulnerable to this and other issues? Should I update to SP2 already (the first time I tried it crashed while installing, didn't even work, but I could prob. get it to work next time). Or should I stay with SP1 for games?

    Thank you.

  20. Re:Not that big of a deal by itsnotthenetwork · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Nobody deserves to get their Boxen hacked, even if they don't always use the best available defenses.
    That is like saying the rape victim is at fault "'cause she looked so sexy"

  21. Re:Not that big of a deal by Dimensio · · Score: 4, Interesting

    I work in a university. Policy is not to have the Windows firewall turned on because it supposedly conflicts with a few needed applications. There is no hardware firewall whatsoever between the internal network and the outside world.

    Oh, and standard policy is to have user accounts set up as Administrator at all times.

    Cleaning up infected machines is a never-ending endeavour. Oddly, the few departments run by competent admins (as in, not the university's IT department) where user accounts are set up only as Users (among other things) don't have any security problems at all. I wonder why..

    Oh, and before anyone blames me: I'm a grunt with no authority whatsoever. I've voiced my objections to the way things are run, but I can do little more than that.

  22. Everyone has good points, and yet.... by writermike · · Score: 4, Funny

    Experts say servers are vulnerable to the infamous CAFE attack. One drop can take down an entire network!

    Granted you have to have a computer next to a cup of coffee for this to work, but MANY PEOPLE DO!!!!!!!!!!

    --
    If Nalgene water bottles are outlawed, only outlaws will have Nalgene water bottles.
  23. Want to do your own testing? by bluelip · · Score: 4, Informative

    Grab a copy of hping2 and try:

    hping2 aaa.bbb.ccc.ddd -s 135 -p 135 -S -a aaa.bbb.ccc.ddd

    Obviously, replace aaa.bbb.ccc.ddd w/ the ip address of the workstation you'd like to test

    --

    Yep, I never spell check.
    More incorrect spellings can be found he
  24. MOD PARENT UP ! by mirko · · Score: 4, Informative

    BSDI 2.1 (vanilla) IS vulnerable
    BSDI 2.1 (K210-021,K210-022,K210-024) NOT vulnerable
    BSDI 3.0 NOT vulnerable
    Digital UNIX 4.0 NOT vulnerable
    FreeBSD 2.2.2-RELEASE IS vulnerable
    FreeBSD 2.2.5-RELEASE IS vulnerable
    FreeBSD 2.2.5-STABLE IS vulnerable
    FreeBSD 3.0-CURRENT IS vulnerable
    HP-UX 10.20 IS vulnerable
    IRIX 6.2 NOT vulnerable
    Linux 2.0.30 NOT vulnerable
    Linux 2.0.32 NOT vulnerable
    MacOS 8.0 IS vulnerable (TCP/IP stack crashed)
    NetBSD 1.2 IS vulnerable
    NeXTSTEP 3.0 IS vulnerable
    NeXTSTEp 3.1 IS vulnerable
    Novell 4.11 NOT vulnerable
    OpenBSD 2.1 IS vulnerable
    OpenBSD 2.2 (Oct31) NOT vulnerable
    SCO OpenServer 5.0.4 NOT vulnerable
    Solaris 2.5.1 IS vulnerable (conflicting reports)
    SunOS 4.1.4 IS vulnerable
    Windows 95 (vanilla) IS vulnerable
    Windows 95 + Winsock 2 + VIPUPD.EXE IS vulnerable

    --
    Trolling using another account since 2005.
  25. Re:I know its been around, but...Linking to source by _bug_ · · Score: 3, Insightful

    I know the land attack is old, but still, linking to a .c ? Why not link to the description of the attack and let that be enough. I was not aware /. was a scriptkiddie toolz warehouse. As stated by the article, there are still probably a bunch of machines this will affect, and putting a link directly to LAND.c on the main page probably isnt such a good idea. Whats next, root kits?

    Honestly. Why don't you just stick your head in the ground every time there's a problem. If you don't see it, it can't be real.

    C'mon. How much more difficult is it to go to google, type in "land.c" and get the source yourself?

    Do you honestly think people visiting /. don't know how to use a search engine?

    Besides, any good system administrator has to assume that every user out there has access to the latest, greatest, and most sophisticated tools to get into their systems.

    And this is an 8 year-old exploit to boot.

    OH NOES! He linked to the h4x0r f13lz! Whut k4nz W3 DOOZ?! C4llz 0wtz t3h wh4mbul4nc3!!!11!!

    It shouldn't matter a single bit what gets linked to. The information is out there, anyone who wants to find it will. You can't try and suppress it. And to say that linking to it makes it easier... what did I just say about search engines? Oh gee, I've been saved a whole 5 seconds from going to google and finding it myself. Maybe all windows machiens will be patched within that time?

  26. "LAND" war in Asia ... by YetAnotherName · · Score: 4, Funny

    Vizzini: You only think I guessed wrong - that's what's so funny. I switched glasses when your back was turned. Ha-ha, you fool. You fell victim to one of the classic blunders, the most famous of which is "Never get involved in a land war in Asia", but only slightly less well known is this: "Never go in against a Sicilian, when *death* is on the line.". Hahahahahah. [Vizzini falls over dead]

    (Yeah, off topic, I don't care.)

  27. And source isn't useful to many people by Sycraft-fu · · Score: 4, Insightful

    I'm not a programmer, so looking through a C file isn't likely to give me any useful information, unless it's in comments at the beginning of the code. What's more, I imagine even programmers would rather just hear a summary than have to sit there and look through a bunch of code to figure out what it does.

    I mean ethical issues aside, it's just not that helpful to most people. I'm sure most people though "WTF is a LAND attack?" and cliked on the link to see. Getting a C file, is probably not the answer they wanted, espically given that it doesn't seem to be transfering, so I can't even see if it has useful comments or not.

    When doing /. stories, link to relivant and if possible, concise descriptions of terms that people are likely to be unfarmilar with. If you want to provide a link to source, do it seperatly and note it as such.

  28. UNLABELED too. by Ungrounded+Lightning · · Score: 4, Insightful

    I know the land attack is old, but still, linking to a .c ? I was not aware /. was a scriptkiddie toolz warehouse.

    Not only that, it was unlabeled. That means anybody who follwed the link now has a copy of the malware in their machine's webcache, minimum. And if they saved it (to keep the list of vulnerable configurations, for example) they have the malware itself.

    This simultaneously puts a bunch of slashdot readers at legal risk (from false prosecution and/or in-court character assasination, based on evidence from a siezed computer) and gives real baddies plausible deniability.

    --
    Bantam Dominique roosters crow a four-note song. Once you've heard it as "Happy BIRTHday" you can't NOT hear it that way
  29. Re:I know its been around, but...Linking to source by __aaijsn7246 · · Score: 4, Informative

    Security through obsecurity doesn't work. Here's the important part of the source :) Basically it just sends a SYN packet which has the target's address as the source and the destination (same port as well).

    ---snip---
    bzero(&buffer,sizeof(struct iphdr)+sizeof(struct tcphdr));
    ipheader->version=4;
    ipheader->ihl=siz eof(struct iphdr)/4;
    ipheader->tot_len=htons(sizeof(struct iphdr)+sizeof(struct tcphdr));
    ipheader->id=htons(0xF1C);
    ipheader->t tl=255;
    ipheader->protocol=IP_TCP;
    ipheader->sad dr=sin.sin_addr.s_addr;
    ipheader->daddr=sin.sin_a ddr.s_addr;

    tcpheader->th_sport=sin.sin_port;
    tcpheader->th _dport=sin.sin_port;
    tcpheader->th_seq=htonl(0xF1 C);
    tcpheader->th_flags=TH_SYN;
    tcpheader->th_of f=sizeof(struct tcphdr)/4;
    tcpheader->th_win=htons(2048);

    bzero(&pseudoheader,12+sizeof(struct tcphdr));
    pseudoheader.saddr.s_addr=sin.sin_addr. s_addr;
    pseudoheader.daddr.s_addr=sin.sin_addr.s_ addr;
    pseudoheader.protocol=6;
    pseudoheader.leng th=htons(sizeof(struct tcphdr));
    bcopy((char *) tcpheader,(char *) &pseudoheader.tcpheader,sizeof(struct tcphdr));
    tcpheader->th_sum=checksum((u_short *) &pseudoheader,12+sizeof(struct tcphdr));
    ---snip---

  30. Re:so what? by m50d · · Score: 4, Insightful

    This isn't funny, it's sad. People have been so brainwashed by MS that they believe it's normal for machines to not be safe if they have a direct internet connection.

    --
    I am trolling
  31. Damnit! by GoNINzo · · Score: 3, Interesting

    I pointed this out YEARS ago. I just don't understand why the updated winsock didn't get used in 2k when they overhauled the tcp stack. (and wow is that an old email addy. heh)

    --
    Gonzo Granzeau
    "Nothing the god of biomechanics wouldn't let you into heaven for.." -Roy Batty
  32. Mod parent down by Ulric · · Score: 5, Insightful

    That's a list of operating systems from 1997, taken out of an exploit from 1997. Linux 2.0.30? Novell 4.11? Solaris 2.5.1?

    1. Re:Mod parent down by FreeUser · · Score: 3, Insightful

      No offense, but the list includes version numbers, so its pretty clear its not a current list.

      It's also clear that (outside of the Microsoft world) newer versions won't suffer the same vulnerability, nor will it be allowed to persist if somehow the same bug does sneak back into the codebase.

      I sometimes wonder if there's a single Microsoft shill or fan with an IQ that breaks triple digits ... I only wish their lobbiests in Europe were so ineffective ... the western world might have been spared its downward spiral into technological backwaterhood...a downward spiral the Chinese have been (and probably will continue to remain) smart enough to recognize as against their national interest and avoid (yes, I'm talking about software patents. Sue me).

      --
      The Future of Human Evolution: Autonomy
  33. Re:Not that big of a deal by Ulric · · Score: 4, Insightful
    Anybody with a web server must accept incoming syn packets. If they are "protected" by something like:
    permit tcp any host 1.2.3.4 eq 80
    Then they are probably vulnerable.
  34. exploit by imipak · · Score: 4, Informative
    Courtesy of the fine (French) folk at k-otik.org... an exploit.

    Unfortuntately the b0rked Slashdot lameness filter won't allow code to be posted even when 'post as code' is selected :?

  35. Might as well unplug it by XSforMe · · Score: 3, Insightful

    The idea behind a server (such as the affected W2K3 server) being connected to a network is to provide a service to the clients. If the machine is not fit to provide services to the network, might as well go back to the store and ask for a reimbursment and exchange to XP workstation.

    The only safe way to safely run this server is to place it behind a SPI firewall. Packet filters will have a hard time detecting and blocking this kind of attack, you will need a full blown SPI to defend and block against these attacks.

    SMCs, Linksys and other consumer level firewall seem to be vulnerable to this thing, the only thing that might save your server is the NAT they might provide. Of course if you are running your server on a public routable IP, then you better start thinking of running a serious setup there.

    --
    My other OS is the MCP!
  36. Turn off the firewall? by prisoner-of-enigma · · Score: 3, Informative

    Granted, you need to have the firewall turned off for this work, but there's a whole lotta machines that don't have it turned on.

    OK, so what you're saying is that in order for XP to be vulnerable, it must be directly connected to the Internet, the user must specifically have disabled the firewall, and no intermediate firewall must be present.

    At what point do we cease blaming Microsoft for stupid user tricks? I mean, Microsoft has freely given SP2 to anyone who wants it. Pretty soon it will be a mandatory download from WindowsUpdate. People bitched and moaned for years that Microsoft didn't do enough for security and didn't default to having updates apply automatically. But when Microsoft finally does improve security (with a better firewall) and tries to turn it all on by default, everyone griped. Damned if you do...

    Look, if a Windows zealot took something like Fedora, turned on a bunch of services, turned off the firewall, and then griped because his box got hacked, Slashdotters everywhere would be screaming that this guy was a fool, that Linux security is great when it's not sabotaged by an idiot at the keyboard. And they'd be right. But when an attack requires that a Windows user actively subvert the very security measures Microsoft's put in place to protect him, everybody blames Microsoft. Nope, no bias to see here, citizens, please move along.

    --
    In the end they will lay their freedom at our feet and say to us, Make us your slaves, but feed us. - Fyodor Dostoyevsky
  37. Solaris 2.5.1? Yes, it's still about. by hot_Karls_bad_cavern · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Believe it or not, some folks still use Solaris 2.5 and 2.6 versions. I used to work at a university whose physics department was fortunate enough to have two electron scanning microscopes, one old and huge and one new, smaller one. The old one had controlling software that was custom, to say the least, and written by a German firm that's been out of business for a few years now.

    Guess what OS the software ran on? And what hardware connections were custom to the old Sparc-based controller the ran the thing? Wohoo! Old Solaris was the only way it'd still 'go'.

    Well, sneaker-net wasn't going to work for the grads that were abroad and well, the profs wanted network access, so they were going to get it. Short of the long, we had to build, tweak and mess with all kinds of junk (tcpwrappers, ssh, ssl) before it went back on the network (yes, that donkey had been hacked before). So yes, there's lots of old Solaris still out there.

    And before anyone asks, yes I finally quit that job due to *not* being able to secure things like this. Authenticating gateways, openvpn, pf on Solaris (boss would *never* let me put that on all the machines we cared for ... unbelievable really), moving *away* from Sendmail, installing Solaris machines with everything locked down, etc, etc). Drove me fucking mad.

  38. Linux version of the exploit by duncanthrax · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Yes, it actually works on SP2. Fire up Task Manager and watch CPU load reach 100% for ~10 seconds for a single packet.

    Here's the code that should compile on Linux.