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PDF Exploits On the Rise
An anonymous reader writes "According to the TrustedSource Blog, malware authors increasingly target PDF files as an infection vector. Keep your browser plugins updated. From the article: 'The Portable Document Format (PDF) is one of the file formats of choice commonly used in today's enterprises, since it's widely deployed across different operating systems. But on a down-side this format has also known vulnerabilites which are exploited in the wild. Secure Computing's Anti-Malware Research Labs spotted a new and yet unknown exploit toolkit which exclusively targets Adobe's PDF format.'"
I'm sure Secure Computing has a product for that. :-/
My blog
It's an owned & bloated container / format. What is really needed is an open and efficent network print protocol.
Any suggestions?
with an .std format ?
Most PDF files have nothing more than text, vector graphics, and images in "read-only" formats. They don't have fill-in-the-blank fields or load-a-codec-and-play-a-video, or active content.
Web browsers need a "simple PDF" plugin that will activate on PDFs. If the "simple PDF" plugin loads a file with content it can't display, it will display what it can and give the user an opportunity to load the file in a full-fledged PDF plugin or external viewer.
Knowledge is how to play a game, intelligence is how to win, wisdom is knowing what game to play.
Portable Virus Format, PVF
Take the cheese to sickbay, the doctor should see it as soon as possible - B'Elanna Torres, "Learning Curve"
Functionality at any cost
And don't forget to not only patch the latested operating system and browser vulnerabilities, but also keep an eye on third-party browser plugins like Adobe Reader, Flash Player and QuickTime.
Why do all these security articles end up basically saying the same thing?
Patch & update, rinse, repeat.
Everything else in these security/warning articles just show you what happens to the people who never patch anything and open anything & everything.
He who knows best knows how little he knows. - Thomas Jefferson
What if you use a PDF reader that's not made by Adobe?
Comment removed based on user account deletion
Hmmmm. Maybe this is because they've crammed all kinds of interactive content into a Portable Document Format?
I mean seriously. I thought the idea of PDFs was "this is as simple as a printed copy, and looks the same."
It's always been the case that human (generally users rather than admins) are the weakest link in the security chain, and this trend only increases as technologies to thwart network and malware attacks become more sophisticated. In the wild, you increasingly see targeted phishing attacks against companies and government agencies.
Unencrypted e-mail only works to the extent that it does because humans can *usually* decide whether a received e-mail is legitimate based on the content. However, in organizations it is common to receive fairly generic e-mails that contain office documents, so if the sender looks right (and does not trigger any of the technological tripwires), an office worker is pretty likely to open a document attached to a generic e-mail -- or worse yet, one that has been tailor-made just for the recipient by attackers.
Of course there are many other mediums over which to transmit PDFs, the clients of which have been rife with bugs despite their ubiquity in the office, but e-mail for the time being is the main vector. This problem won't go away until we either have:
1. Suitable, ubiquitous, open-source software to open office documents with security as a main focus of the projects, AND/OR
2. Authenticated e-mail with secure PKI structures (glwt).
Use the Sumatra PDF Reader. It is a very lightweight reader. Since it doesn't have all the other useless bloat crap that Adobe's reader has, I'm sure it is a lot less vulnerable. It is also open source, so you don't have to rely on downloading an even more bloated version of Acrobat Reader to fix the exploits.
http://blog.kowalczyk.info/software/sumatrapdf/
I have this installed on all of the PCs here at the office. It has eliminated just about all of the issues i had with the adobe crapware.
PDF is essentially a compressed, higher ability Postscript, right? Postscript is a language, and that therefore would be how malware writers exploit it--they exploit bugs in the readers, which are essentially compilers--to compromise a system.
Colin Dean Go a year without DRM
Interestingly enough, I have gotten 3 PDFs in the past few days in my corporate email inviting me to various "seminars" on technology subjects. All were very well written and professional looking but for products I have never used and companies I had not heard of. They passed both my email server's scanning and the local virus scan on my company laptop, however since I have very rarely gotten PDFs in the past I am now very suspicious.
Jonah HEX
Horror & SciFi Erotic Nudes
Exploit the Windows operating system cause the majority of users have it. Exploit Internet Explorer because the majority of users have it. Exploit Office products because the majority of users have it. Exploit Adobe's PDF format because the majority of users have it.
There is now Mac OS, various Linux distros, etc. There is FireFox, Opera, Chrome, etc. There is Open Office, etc. Maybe Adobe needs some good competition in the eyes of the public?
no, literally. The screenshot of this baby blue office-vista-style malware app has made me blind.
Do not trust this signature.
Wait, we're supposed to trust the findings from SCAM Research Labs?
Personally, I'm waiting to get a job at Secure Computing's Over-The-Counter Hardware Research Lab.
As much as "Patch and Update" is a mantra with many other pieces of software, Adobe Acrobat is the quintessential example of bloatware-gone-wild. I stick with Reader 4.0 simply because I can't stand the awful evolution of the software; for things that Reader 4.0 can't open, I use Ghostscript/GSView32. Would Reader 4.0, on account of its antiquity, still be vulnerable to these exploits? I'd really prefer to not have to have whatever current iteration of Acrobat that's out there on my machine.
When I used to use Windows, I found Acrobat to be the most intrusive software ever because of its auto-update. Pretty much every time you try to open a document it's in your face demanding you allow it to update itself and then it often requests a reboot (a reboot? For a PDF viewer??)
This seemed to happen every other week, even if appeased it by letting it do its thing. I suspect this update would be one possible attack vector.
Yet another case in which a "fuck off" key would be a useful addition to the Windows keyboard.
The Javascript stuff, the embedded media formats, all the other scripting nonsense, e-mail, the "phone-home-to-Adobe's-servers" auto-update junk, and other fluff that is irrelevant to presenting an ordinary document, and you end up with A) a faster and less bloated program, B) a less vulnerable program.
Alternatively, use a third-party PDF viewer and save yourself the grief of stripping that stuff out of Adobe's version, because Adobe doesn't make it easy to do without plenty of trial and error. For that matter, Adobe could get a clue and ship a "Lite" version themselves.
are xpdf, kpdf, etc safe (i.e this is just an implementation error in adobes product) or are any of these problems systematic of the format (e.g you need to let the file access font files to check if it has them, bad example but you get the idea)?
The biggest issue is overuse and inappropriate use of PDF.
The only reason to ever use PDF is if it is NECESSARY for your audience to print the document in question.
Way too often websites have PDFs that are the only alternative for information. If you want to look up a train time for example, once and once only, you almost always have to download a PDF -- why? Sure, give people the choice of doing that if they want to, but there's no reason to slow down the internet for one-off pieces of information.
With concerns about the environment (perceived real or theatrical, regardless), you'd think that firms would stop encouraging frivolous use of paper. With the extortionate cost of printer ink, you'd think that firms would also be cost-conscious.
Uploading a 2 or 3 page document to the web in a PDF format is a criminal waste of resources, it's also an irritation that I don't need. I do not (and will never) work in a corporation. I do not need Office or PDF format -- ever. It's slow, and it's crap to read online.
I can cheerfully live my entire life without it, and I sincerely wish retarded developers and content managers would stop forcing it on me.
There should be a disclaimer on these sort of product-placement articles. Oh wait, there is, it was posted by timothy.
I'm no fan of the PDF format, but it has a place in this world because a) it serves a specific purpose, b) it works reasonably well for that purpose, and c) there isn't any popular format out there to take its place.
Compared with other popular formats, the defining feature of PDF is that it's designed to be turned into sheets of dead tree at some point. Separate pages, with fixed vertical and horizontal size. PDF is very useful for that purpose, but it's often used in places where it makes no sense.
I come accross PDF's mostly as technical documentation like datasheets (for electronic components). Mostly these are scanned pages (dead tree original), linked together as a single PDF file. I use those PDF's only for viewing on a computer, they don't ever make it back to paper. For this use, I would much rather have plain HTML, with illustrating pictures and so on packed in a single file. This would take much less space (text-based vs. scanned images), load up faster (browser!) and allow for easier navigation, searching, and editing. But you know what? Clicking on a .pdf is more convenient than unzipping a directory filled with with HTML, and opening an index file in there (for the user). And scanning 20 pages, linking them into a .pdf file is easier than doing a full conversion to text, and create decently formatted HTML (for the producer). Therefore PDF usually wins, even though there's more efficient ways to bring the info from A to B.
For above application, the reason for PDF's popularity stems from the form of the original (dead tree), and that users are expected to turn the documents back into that format. Why use online viewing all over your office, when you can *wastefully* turn things back into paper and drag around briefcases filled with the stuff?
From what I've seen, the average office still isn't used to going all electronic when it comes to documentation. When you follow a course, you don't get an USB stick stuffed with HTML to crawl through (or pointer to internal company webpage). You get a pile of A4 sheets.
For stuff that I create myself, I prefer HTML, or in general: the simplest format that will bring the info from A to B and is easy for online viewing. How you can turn it into A4 sheets is of secondary importance. But until a true '21st century' paperless office becomes the norm, PDF will have its place.
Although I usually decry any MS Windows-only feature proposal for not supporting Linux, I feel it is appropriate in this case.
Rich And Stupid is not so bad as Working For Rich And Stupid.
Firefox should ship with some minimal PDF reader instead of Adobe's. There's an incredible amount of junk in Adobe's PDF reader, which adds both vulnerabilities and load time. Has anyone ever used the WebBuy feature of Adobe PDF Reader?
Could this be a feature?
Its freeware. Does same thing.
I suspect, that its not the PDF format itself that has 'vulnerabilities' but it is in fact a certain well-known software the *reads* PDF format. And possibly only when running on a certain well-known software platform that is itself not famous for its lack of vulnerabilities.
Of course, the vast majority of PHB's and Joe Sixpacks don't have the capacity or inclination to understand those distinctions, so TFA didn't bother to make it.
1. Has a tendency to make your browser freeze up
2. Tries to infect some sort of TSR in Windows called Acrord32
3. Will frequently pop up a "checking for updates" dialog
4. Makes the fastest of computers slow to a crawl.
5. a super-jumpy scrolling interface
No wait, those aren't malware symptoms, that's just in Adobe's product. Next week we will discuss the incredible annoyances of the "java runtime environment" daily annoyances & clog-ups in "Add/Remove Programs". Do ANY software vendors know how annoying their software can be at times? Even Apple is guilty of forcing add-on installs you have no choice to get out of.
PDF displayers are a great example of the kind of application that should be trivially sandboxable. The process needs access to hardly anything; no network access needed, no filesystem access is even needed (just pipe the data in).
It should run as nobody.
As copyright owner of this comment, I authorize everyone to defeat any technological measure which limits access to it.
Is the link in pdf format???
This title begs for a notnews. I just can't think of any ideas for it. Although WordPad for Windows 7 is probably vulnerable.
http://rocknerd.co.uk
Mac Firefox users can get a similar lightweight pdf plugin that uses the same libraries with this plugin.
Adobe PDF plugin was removed sometime ago permanently due to machine crashs it provoked.
Acrobat reader also removed.
PDF vulnerability has been known for about 10 years.
I had a long chat with Jim King, chief scientist
at Adobe, back at Seybold 99. Even back then it
was easy to write PDF files to delete things off the
local disk or create and execute programs on the local system.
Mac, PC, Solaris all vulnerable
and have been for a long, long time.
PDF is a target rich environment. I will be sad to
see it go the way of USENET and reliable email.
One of the reasons XPS is designed with no
execution environment is because it is well known
that PDF is a nightmare. XPS has its own series of problems.
Does anybody need to know how to
use XPS as an attack vector?
Keath de TT: I told you so!
+1
"Anyway, I doubt the alternative PDF readers suffer from the security issues present in Acrobat Reader. -GayGirlie" - by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday September 23, @11:53AM (#25121643)
Don't be too sure...
( ... &, this is just 1 single example thereof, since I saw it mentioned here on this site about this topic, as to Adobe Acrobat Reader replacements/alternate programs)
FOXIT PDF READER 2.x SERIES:
http://secunia.com/advisories/product/12995/
Affected By 2 Secunia advisories, 3 Vulnerabilities
You might want to check your EVINCE program @ SECUNIA.COM as well, just to be sure.
APK
P.S.=> You may find SECUNIA.COM useful in researching any applications you might be using, for this kind of information... &, for choosing the alternates you intend to try out on your machines as well, for this very application's (Adobe Acrobat Reader) replacement (FoxIT is just one I saw suggested here, & I was aware of it having security vulnerabilities, & that's why I used it to illustrate my point here)... apk
I'm sorry, but in that very brief article linked, I saw absolutely ZERO analysis concerning frequency.
YAY! There's an exploit and toolkit. The existence of which is, in some sense, a useful piece of prior information for establishing the probability that there MIGHT BE an increase in frequency in the future - but it's quite a leap to have a freakin' /. link to a corporate article that uses hyperbole in claiming that there is some State of Nature or State of Knowledge that points to .pdf attacks being "On the rise".
"oohhh... I didn't know Schopenhauer was a philosopher!"
The solution to the imperfect scan is to scan the image and present that to the reader, but OCR it and use that as the basis for searching. Sure, the search results will be imperfect but they'll be useful.
Google Books is essentially this.
Knowledge is how to play a game, intelligence is how to win, wisdom is knowing what game to play.
Since Adobe Reader has such a bad rep, can anyone recommend a good free alternative for my windows box at work?
"Can't you see that everyone is buying station wagons?"
From the link you reference:
That vulnerability is from 2006, it was patched long ago.
From the link:
Adobe Reader v.8, OTOH, still has an unpatched vulnerablity --- but v.9 is clean, as far as Secunia is concerned. The statistics for total vulnerabilities:
Adobe Reader v.7 = 22 vulnerabilities (all patched)
Adobe Reader v.8 = 12 vulnerabilities (all patched but 1)
Adobe Reader v.9 = 0 vulnerabilities
Evince = 1 vulnerability (patched)
Foxit = 3 vulnerabilities (all patched)
Note that Secunia does not recommend blindly comparing statistics in this way, and they're right.
We provide xpdf and (Sun's build of) gpdf on our Solaris machines here. On the SPARCs we (and Sun) also provide Acroread and the plugin. I'm more worried about problems in the plugin since that's more likely to get weird stuff loaded. I was about to update it on the SPARCs anyway.
Of course Adobe still refuses to provide acroread for x86 Solaris. Though they do on the SPARC and I am about 100% sure the same source code would work there as well (everything else does...). In fact, why would it be different from any other UNIX/X11 version?
So why can't we get it? Because they refuse to provide it, not on any technical grounds, but just because. They just won't do it because... because they're jerks? I guess. So if the security problem's in their implementation, I'll just remove it from the SPARCs and make all our Solaris machines the same.
PDF Files? Are the editors of this webroom a bunch of kiddy fiddlers?
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
Duh, all software use has risks. This whole sub-thread is a discussion about the relative benefits, including risks of future vulnerabilities, of various PDF display programs.
Adobe Reader, in terms of the number of known vulnerabilities, doesn't give a very good impression. The last 3 versions, versions 7-9, have had a total of 34 vulnerabilities. Unfortunately, it is practically impossible to quantitatively compare this with the 1 vulnerability found in Evince, since: