Slashdot Mirror
Hacker Publishes Notorious Apple Wi-Fi Attack
inkslinger77 writes "It's been about a year since David Maynor claimed to have found a way to take over a Mac using a flaw in a Wireless driver. He's now published his work for public scrutiny. Maynor had been under a nondisclosure agreement, which had previously prevented him from publishing details of the hack, but the NDA is over now and by going public with the information, Maynor hopes to help other Apple researchers with new documentation on things like Wi-Fi debugging and the Mac OS X kernel core dumping facility."
Here's a link to the actual paper.
And here's the important part:
"Anyone who [rips a CD] is probably engaging in copyright infringement." - David O. Carson
Yes, it affected Apple, too, but It was a general "hack" that affected WiFi chipsets on other platforms, including non-Apple hardware, Windows, and Linux!
That's the whole point of why people took issue with this, and it's still being perpetuated here!
The way it was presented, even if Maynor didn't intend it as such, especially in all of the press coverage - first IT press, then mainstream, CNN, hundreds of local papers via AP, you name it - was that it was an "Apple" WiFi hack only, and that anyone could easily and quickly completely take over your MacBook remotely.
The stories just got repeated and regurgitated over and over, even though it was a flaw that affected a lot more than Apple; indeed, the most interesting thing about the vulnerability was its universal nature and applications!
Also, in the initial reports, Maynor and Ellch hid the brand and vendor of external wireless adapter they used for the demo because of, according to them, "responsible disclosure", but then had no problems saying the exploit worked identically on a stock MacBook. So if it was important to hide the brand of the wireless adapter they used for the demo, why was it not equally important to hide the fact that the chipset in a MacBook was vulnerable? How is it fair for this to appear as an exploit affecting only Apple, appearing under headlines like "MacBook hacked in 30 seconds - remotely via wireless!"
Given that Mac users apparently needed to have "lit cigarettes stuck in their eyes" - and whether that was a joke or not, I don't see how that's professional coming from someone who is a "security researcher" presenting findings under the guise of what purports to be a professional security outfit - it appeared that the choice to use a MacBook for the demo and the ensuing firestorm of publicity was done exactly for that reason.
Would this have been news if they had used a Dell or Lenovo laptop running Windows or Linux, even if they also still said that this affected multiple platforms, including Mac OS X?
This affected more than the just the chipsets and drivers in use in Apple laptops. It could be used in the same fashion on any affected chipset, potentially under various drivers on multiple OSes. The MacBook was just chosen as a point of principle to show that Macs, too, can be vulnerable to such attacks. This was noted in the initial coverage in the IT press at the time, but was quickly ignored in favor of a neverending flow of sensationalist articles claiming that any attacker could now easily take over MacBooks - and only MacBooks - at will in less than 30 seconds, and wirelessly to boot.
Unfortunately, the opposing storm of FUD was just as bad, making it appear that the whole wireless vulnerability was a hoax, when in reality it was probably one of the more important general WiFi/driver vulnerabilities in recent memory. The choice of how to disclose was extremely poorly managed, and to make statements to the effect that you essentially wanted to stick it to Mac users when working under the guise of a supposedly professional and reputable security firm was what caused the problems. He embarrassed the hell out of SecureWorks by ending up with a firestorm of press that was massively bad PR for Apple.
So what, you say? It was bad press for Apple, and ONLY Apple. No other vendor of manufacturer got nailed by this in any substantive way. With Apple having such low marketshare, how is it fair for only Apple to be targeted in press articles about this? Not Maynor's fault? No, not exactly, but some of his initial choices for handling are absolutely what led to the situation. I'm sure he had little idea this would occur and just got caught up in the world between security research and disclosure on one side, and corporations and mainstream media on the other.
The first rule about and NDA: "You don't talk about an NDA". The second rule about an NDA is: " You don't talk about an NDA".
Yes, it did get a huge reaction.
That was AFTER it had already been picked up by the press, including mainstream non-IT press, under sensationalist headlines, and with no mention in the article that anything BUT Apple's new flagship portable was affected.
This was in the first two days before there was any rabid or insane reaction that anyone in any of these news outlets knew about (except for maybe Krebs at the Washington Post, who seemed determined to give this story legs at any cost).
The story ran under headlines like "New Mac laptops vulnerable" and "MacBook hacked in 30 seconds - wirelessly". The story ran not only in the traditional IT rags, which sometimes had the journalistic accuracy to also say the vulnerability could affect other hardware platforms and OSes just the same, but in national mainstream press outlets, including AP, which gets picked up by hundreds and hundreds of local news papers and other local media, and gets seen by millions more people than will ever see anything in Network World or The Register.
All at a time when more people than ever were considering a move to Mac OS X after the switch to Intel. Their only takeaway as they scanned the morning paper or caught a segment on the local morning news? That the "MacBook" can be "taken over" in "30 seconds", wirelessly, and all without you knowing. Hmm, might as well stay with Windows after all.
So yeah...as I already noted in another post, the reaction from the Mac crowd was even worse, FUDing the story into oblivion. However, the initial coverage wasn't because of that. At all. In any way, shape or form. It was because a security vulnerability affecting Macs is interpreted by many to be BIG NEWS, whether they're the kind of journalist (as a few in the IT press are) who want to trumpet negative Apple stories, or just simply some guy at AP who sees it as a unique story. NONE of the original coverage, which was the only substantive coverage and what had already caused the damage, was because of the Mac fanboy reaction. Rather, it was the opposite.
the Mac community spent an enormous amount of time trying to destroy Maynor's credibility
Maynor did everything he could to destroy his own credibility.
He misrepresented the nature of the vulnerability. Not because he was under an NDA, mind you, but because
[OSX was promoted as] being free of the viruses and malware that plague Windows,
It still is. Because it still is free of them. Not because it's "invulnerable" (people who talk about it being invulnerable - pro or con - shouldn't be trusted... and that includes you), but because it's a competently designed UNIX based OS that takes advantage of layered security. There's some aggravating design flaws that are bigger problems than a fixable bug in Wifi (yes, really), but the bottom line is that it's got a fundamentally more secure design than Windows in many areas that really matter, and THAT has a huge effect.
and even GNU/Linux doesn't have a reputation for being invulnerable
Wrong. Linux has been promoted as being a virus free haven for Windows users for at least as long as OS X has, and it's been pushed harder. And, yes, it ALSO has the advantage of a good traditional UNIX design.
But if Maynor REALLY wanted to show off, he'd have attacked OpenBSD.
and suddenly Maynor found there was a massive hole in that
So? People find holes in OSX regularly. And I mean ACTUAL holes unique to OS X, not holes shared by a lot of common devices. ACTUAL cases of the SAME KIND of hole (buffer overrun), even. This is not a "massive hole in OS X" at all, and if he hadn't turned around and (a) attacked Apple specifically, and (b) refused to disclose the bug itself (and I don't believe in an NDA that would have kept him from telling Apple about a buffer overflow in a Wifi driver), nobody would have said boo to him.
But he didn't act responsibly. He wanted to grandstand and he wanted to hurt Apple, specifically. I mean, he said he had a grudge against Apple right there on his web page. That's not responsible, and has nothing to do with any NDA. Even it's not actually lying and even arguably not honest, it sure ain't honorable.
So here we have someone who's acting irresponsibly, and implying he's being paid to find security holes he's not allowed to talk about (and he still hasn't explained that bit), and who's specifically targeting one company... what kind of reaction should he expect?
I'd tell you, but I'd have to NDA you first.
i'm sorry, but this WHOLE THING became a kerfuffle when Maynor stated that Apple threatened him... and not a second before that.
And i have a very very hard time believing that Maynor is telling the truth about that because Apple has an incredible track record on not only accepting information, but giving credit where credit is due to people that find problems and exploits
Here are 28 examples between 10.4.1-10.4.3 where Apple gave credit to security researchers, organizations, and individuals.
So, Maynor found something, acted very suspiciously, made lame comments, hid information, and blamed Apple for all of it.
He's a choad.
guns kill people like spoons make Rosie O'Donnell fat.