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The Black Hat Wi-Fi Exploit
Joe Barr writes to tell us that while many have heard that an Apple was exploited in order to install a rootkit at the recent BlackHat security conference, most people don't know the details of how it works. This is no mistake, it seems that the researchers who demonstrated the flaw were intentionally vague. Some theorize that this is in response to the real or perceived threat of legal action similar to the situation with previous Blackhat presenter, Michael Lynn.
Perhaps it is the exploiter who is better off with the Atheros based WLAN card? Maybe it is still possible to exploit any other WLAN card, but the attacker may benefit from using some WLAN cards over others as the attacking host platform (not the attacked target platform). Reference: http://www.ktwo.ca/security.html
The presenters clearly got paid off by apple.. in the defcon talk they were whinging about the metasploit guys being offered $80,000 to $120,000 for unreleased exploits and they weren't prepared to release the code to the emails they got offering $10, $100, $1000 for the copies of the exploit
That's why in the video they used a "generic" wifi card when they admitted the standard apple wifi driver is broken as well
They said they haven't released the code because "they need to check all the apple platforms that are effected" IE they are waiting for apple to deliver them a whole bunch of free hardware
These guys were complete sell outs -- no live demonstration because they were afraid that the WIFI would be sniffed at DEFCON..... so coming to a full disclosure conference they are basically saying they don't trust disclosing to the attendees...
In the video they call the script "bad seed" so it's probably something to do with a PRNG in the crypto somewhere (or IV)
If this exploit exists on other platforms? Like say, the free Unix-clones like FreeBSD or Linux?
-- Linux user #369862
First hand::Ellch talked a lot about the timings and the reactions of wireless cards to certain packets, as well as the need for a less fatty and feature full tcp/ip protocol. From the talk it sounded like Maynor developed the particular exploit. Ellch talked about his tool fuzze. Ellch's goal was to fingerprint particular wireless users and the driver model they were using....(to decide what Metasploit exploit you'll use this week) If I was a wireless guru, say like some of the other thousands alive, I could make a prediction. If they don't release the exploit soon, someone else will develop an equally powerful exploit into the wild. Buffer overflow the stack..... It's too fat and does more thinking than it should. I say patience is key. Even when they do develop the patch, how many coffee shop users don't apply patches? The biggest weakness in the attack is the fact that it sounds like a proximity attack. If you're not within wireless reach to the victim, you won't be able to attack them. That's just a guess since the video demo of the attack shows the attack from across a desk and not across the office. Cantenna anyone? Wifi-shootout?
Bottom line, assuming the demo is not a hoax, it will work against *nix, Windows, and Mac equally.
Intel PRO/Wireless Network Connection Drivers Remote Code Execution Vulnerabilities . Look at that, a remotely exploitable security hole in the Wifi driver. Anyone using one of these things is vulnerable if they have not upgraded their Wifi drivers, regardless of OS. This was disclosed by the vendor (Intel).
I guess you were right. No facts, just theories.
misleading eh?
if you were aware of the (limited) details that have been released, you'd know that while the vulnerability that the presenters (Jon Ellch and David Maynor) used was vendor specific, it still worked on the macbook's internal airport card
The demonstration was not really intended to point out the specific problem with these mac drivers. It was more intended to highlight several industry wide problems.
I'm not about to say that letting consumers know about these problems will help or hinder them in any way.. nor will pointing out any specific company. If these problems are as prevalent as Ellch and Maynor claim, virtually no amount of consumer education would solve the problem, and pointing the finger would be the security equivalent of sweeping the problem under the rug.
http://www.xkcd.com/354/
''This is not a simple matter of exploiting a serivce. The machine might does not even need any publicly accessible services for this attack to be effective.''
That is the claim being made, and it would be frightening if true. We have not seen any reliable evidence of this so far.
''We all know that wireless cards require soft firmware and drivers in the OS these days. The point is that it's possible to exploit the drivers with specially crafted packets and make the OS run arbitrary code that it thinks is the Wireless driver.''
That is the claim that has been made. We have not seen any reliable evidence of this so far. I think it would be quite easy to own a Macintosh running MacOS X if you use an external card needing a driver, and you install your own, specially crafted driver on the machine that will do exactly what you want. We have no evidence that this works when using the preinstalled Apple driver or the manufacturer's driver for the card.
''Running code at the level of the OS brings with it full control over the machine. The OS trusts the drivers 100% on almost every system I've used. This means your newly running code can take full control of the machine, and probably even download more code, sniff on you, etc. ''
May be true, but there is no evidence that you can take control of a driver as it was claimed.
''It should be possible to exploit this attack even if the machine is connected to a trusted network. All you need to do is send it packets on that network (or pretend to be on that network).''
And possibly go to the machine you want to exploit first with a CD in your hand, and install your replacement drivers.
''The demo might have been vague, but it still points out some serious flaws with wireless systems on modern operating systems - anyone can send you packets and the OS trusts the software processing those packets 100%...''
The demo may have been vague because it was a hoax. So far this seems much more probable to me.