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Researchers Show How To Take Control of Windows 7
alphadogg writes "Security researchers demonstrated how to take control of a computer running Microsoft's upcoming Windows 7 operating system at the Hack In The Box Security Conference (HITB) in Dubai on Thursday. Researchers Vipin Kumar and Nitin Kumar used proof-of-concept code they developed, called VBootkit 2.0, to take control of a Windows 7 virtual machine while it was booting up. 'There's no fix for this. It cannot be fixed. It's a design problem,' Vipin Kumar said, explaining the software exploits the Windows 7 assumption that the boot process is safe from attack. While VBootkit 2.0 shows how an attacker can take control of a Windows 7 computer, it's not necessarily a serious threat. For the attack to work, an attacker must have physical access to the victim's computer. The attack can not be done remotely." Which makes me wonder why I'm posting this :)
We hear about it all the time, laptops being stolen, left out, all with tons of sensitive data. Combine this with a lot of companies having very poor physical security this could be more than something to just write off.
The musings of just another geek and his junk.
If you got physical access already, it shouldn't be a surprise you can root the box.
If someone has physical control of the machine, all bets are off.
Rule 1 of computers is, if someone has physical access to your machine, it has already been compromised. I always design my security around this fact, and if a machine needs to be secure against attack, it will be physically secure.
It's been a long time.
This is barely a hack. I can steal any car in the world. Give me the keys, some gas, and park it in my drive way. Watch me steal it with ease! HA!
If you boot from a Live CD, since you have physical access to the machine, isn't it essentially the same thing? I'm confused about how this is a vulnerability.
-- NeilO
There's a rather important aspect of this that's not discussed - how does this code get onto the computer in the first place to be executed during boot ?
OK, I'm not a Mac guy so I can say nothing about it. I've also not used Windows 7.
But, really. If you give me physical access to damned near any Windows or Linux machine, it's owned. And there are a lot of people out there a helluva lot better then me.
Sure, I won't be able to crack your encrypted archives. Nor your well-protected stored passwords. But hacking root/admin with physical access to the box isn't rocket science. Actually, it's much tougher with Vista than any Linux distro I've run into.
He's getting rather old, but he's a good mouse.
Im as anti-microsoft as the rest of you (at least the intelligent folk), but are you all seriously claiming that linux or unix distros are immune to tampering with the boot partition?
I would assume the only way to be immune against this type of attack would be encrypting the system partition, and a "bootkit" as they seem to be calling it that is aware of encryption may even be able to deal with that.
Whats the story here again? That booting into a secondary OS gives you full control of data on an unencrypted hard drive?
if it is a remote exploit that doesn't involve user interaction, I definitely want to hear about it (like homeland security's red=everybody panic)
If it is a remote exploit that requires user interaction, I still want to hear about it (condition=orange)
If it is a local exploit/privilege escalation that doesn't require root, it might be interesting (yellow)
If it is a local exploit that requires root privileges, leave it off the front page.
I was going to say... if you have physical access, you can take out the hard drive, put it in another box, muck around with the data in any way you want and put it back. I'm an Apple fanboi at heart, but, geeze, this seems like a big, honkin' "What-ever!" to me.
The CB App. What's your 20?
'There's no fix for this. It cannot be fixed. It's a design problem,
There is always a fix. Every vulnerability is a "design problem". Sometimes the code to fix it is a separate app (e.g. firewall, virus protection), and sometimes it requires modification to the code. There is always a fix in software - it's just a matter of making it.
This guy stating there is no fix, it can't be fixed is making statements about as dumb as those who say their favorite OS (e.g. OS X) is immune from any virus/worms/hacks.
I do not support "The Man". I also do not support your irrational stupidity
At first glance at the thread title, my first thought was pop a Linux CD into the drive and reboot
Voila no more Win7
"Suppose you were an idiot...and suppose you were a member of Congress...but I repeat myself." Mark Twain
This also isn't a windows-specific vulnerability: any OS which does not checksum memory contents each time they're read is vulnerable.
Even that wouldn't matter, because the first thing I'd in-memory patch is the checksum algorithm to always return 'ok'.
The only real way to resolve this would be a-la console style 'trusted computing, and digital signatures through the whole bios and bootstrap process'. Of course, even this could be 'hacked' or 'modchipped' but at least it wouldn't be as simple as just putting in a disk.
There is no security if they have enough physical access.
... the reason you are posting this article is to spread anti-microsoft hate and FUD for no reason.
Why not post:
With a gentoo install CD you can gain control of any linux system by overwriting key /etc/ files to give yourself root access unless you use encrypted drives...
More useless propaganda from an MS-hater. I mean seriously, this is news? Next thing you'll post is the Windows 7 has a horrible exploit that crashes it every time you shoot the PC with a shot gun.
Don't we have a NO FUD policy for articles?
"Everyone is entitled to be stupid, but some abuse the privilege", as a result of this abuse, your Stupid License has been suspended for 60 days.
-=[ Who Is John Galt? ]=-
In the absence of physical security, taking over a vista, linux, mac os x or (insert vendor here) UNIX system is not difficult, providing you know the platform. No, the 'average gramma' can't do it, but most of us most likely can - with not much more than a google search and a quick download.
I'm not a microsoft (or apple, or linux) fanboi by any means, but a system is only as secure as you actually make it. Disk encryption helps - it's a great idea - so I've honestly never met anyone who's used it.
While this is certainly an interesting exploit, I doubt highly that many systems will be compromised in the wild with it.
http://www.bistolas.net
much tougher with Vista than any Linux distro I've run into.
And us linux users consider that a feature.
"linux is just DOS with a UNIX like syntax" -- Galactic Dominator (944134)
Yes - My first system breach (not counting MS systems that were completely unsecured - I mean actually circumventing security) in the wild was back in the early 90's - A university *nix system. The thing that made (makes) *nix such an easy target is that you can actually understand how it works. Windows is full of holes, but it's so frigging weird and hard to wrap your head around the bizarre OS that the casual cracker won't bother learning what's going on. If your only goal is to satisfy some childish desire to breach security and smugly toss your hands in the air and declare yourself an 31337 hacker (as was my case), Linux is the way to go.
Agreed - Being able to understand your OS is indeed a feature for people living in Linux world.
He's getting rather old, but he's a good mouse.
If someone has physical control of the machine, all bets are off.
Ah, apparently you've never heard of Phil Zimmerman or have ever seen a James Bond movie, have you?
Point here is there is quite a bit that has and can be done even at the physical layer. Drive Encryption (PGP) is but one option, and given the track record of PGP, I'd say a pretty damn good one. TrueCrypt is a great free alternative too.
And I for one am glad this was posted. Just helps enlighten everyone on the importance of good security practice regardless of how shiny and new the OS is.
There are no foolproof Operating Systems out there, just fools who think there are.
How is it any different to shoving in a Linux Live CD, running BartPE or running Windows setup, doing a repair install and sticking your own account on?
I only please one person per day. Today is not your day. Tomorrow isn't looking good either. - Scott Adams
Whereas with Linux you just boot into single user mode & use passwd to set the root password.
Not a sentence!
Unless, of course, the admin has set the box up to require a password for single user mode as well.