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IE8, Safari, iPhone All Fall At Pwn2Own Contest
SpuriousLogic writes "The annual Pwn2Own contest at CanSecWest is underway, and on the first day Web browsers fell to attack. Internet Explorer 8 and Firefox 3.6.2 on 64-bit Windows 7 and Safari on OS X all were forced to run exploit code. To add insult to injury, an iPhone was cracked and the SMS database lifted from it."
Updated 22:40 GMT by timothy: CWmike adds this interesting bit: "The only researcher to three-peat at the Pwn2Own hacking contest said on Thursday that security is such a 'broken record' that he won't hand over 20 vulnerabilities he's found in Apple's, Adobe's and Microsoft's software. Instead Charlie Miller will show the vendors how to find the bugs themselves."
Title misleading maybe... just a bit? Firefox got owned as well.
... these guys (and gals?) all know what they are going to try before they ever get to this contest. It's not like they discover all these vulnerabilities during some epiphany once they arrive.
On the other hand, these security holes are real and need to be addressed by anyone and everyone that was shamed (this means MS, Apple, Mozilla, everyone) pronto!
It was already known and acknowledged by Microsoft that their ASLR implementation on 32-bit Windows was rather weak, but apparently the 64-bit version of it can be bypassed as well, as all of the hacks of pwn2own on Windows 7 made use of return-to-libc attacks, which should be impossible on systems with address space layout randomization.
Pretty good is actually pretty bad.
The exploits were of course not found in the 5, 10 or 15 minutes advertised. They were all worked on for weeks, and even months, and were well-tested and prepared before being executed at the contest like a rehearsed stage play. Also worth to note is that the reason behind "Chrome only browser that withstood security breach" was that NO ONE TESTED CHROME AT ALL. I give this particular "Pwn2Own" show no credibility what so ever because of these details.
the very fact that these people know what to do beforehand is proof that app security is generally terrible.
Well, I think you have a very good point there - but on the other hand, the developers do have to prioritize the work they do. Finding and fixing a serious, but hard-to-discover security flaw before this flaw has become widely disseminated may not be worth the effort. In principle "security through obscurity" isn't a good policy but in practice it's often good enough. If the software has a serious flaw but nobody knows about it, that's good enough, at least temporarily.
Bow-ties are cool.
Isn't your point about Chrome invalidated by your point about the time taken?
Did no one attack Chrome because none of these researchers had an exploit that would work against it?
There are no trails. There are no trees out here.
I believe what you really meant to say was that we shouldn't fall into the trap of believing that Chrome is actually safer due to the fact that no one really targeted it in this contest.
I've done my share of "Digital Combat Exercises" and you are correct that we should only view the contest as a verification that flaws exist, and not as a certification that a particular platform is safe.
For my first competition, my team concentrated on all the windows machine on the network because we had a list of known exploits and figured that we could exploit them the quickest and therefore accumulate the highest score possible within the time limits. All teams used the same strategy, and the Linux machines weren't even targeted. This wasn't because Linux was safer, it was because we all knew Windows was a softer target. This made for a some very close final scores.
For the following year's contest (which I couldn't participate due to a schedule conflict), my old team paid attention to the known exploits for Linux and started targeting them to guarantee a larger lead going into the final minutes of the contest.
I think you'll see this pattern in all "hacker" contests. Each year more platforms will fall as each team strategize on what will give them the edge during the time alloted. You'll probably see Chrome fall next year. Look at Safari in Pwn2Own, it wasn't until 2 years ago before people started to seriously attack it for the points.
These comments are my own and do not necessarily reflect the views or opinions of my employer or colleagues...
This wasn't because Linux was safer, it was because we all knew Windows was a softer target.
Whoa, whoa, WHOA. Just stop right there, Bill. I'm going to have to teach you a thing or to about what you're allowed to write here on Slashdot. Now give me a second to get on my high-horse.
Reasoning is not welcome here.
That's right Bill. We don't need your reasoning here. We know we are right. This is Slashdot! We are the tech community. We know our OSes. We know our software. Just because of some contest with some rules and some teams that want to win the contest by the rules doesn't automatically invalidate our knowledge and wisdom as Slashdot.
Linux is more secure because it is open source and licensed under the GPL. It doesn't matter if it is still unsafe by your standards.
You see, Bill, we on Slashdot do not need to review the source code of Linux because we have declared it safe. Why is it safe? Because it is GPL. And everyone knows the GPL is safe. Therefore Linux is safe, Bill.
IE8 is mentioned first because it is owned by Microsoft, and Microsoft is evil due to historical technology atrocities against other for-profit software corporations. Therefore IE8 is the worst piece of software ever to exist.
So the reason why IE8 falls faster is not because you and your team thought the Microsoft product was "softer". It was because it was the spawn of the devil! Even wackos know the spawn of the devil should be hacked first. Don't you agree?
Firefox is not listed in the title because we need to get a head start on bashing proprietary software rather than reading the summary.
As a real Slashdotter, I pride myself in not reading the article let alone the summary. The title effectively summarizes the direction of all comments in the thread. And that direction is to bash proprietary software, starting with Microsoft first.
Here's a tip, Bill. The headline on Slashdot should give you a hint at what kind of comment you should post on Slashdot. If you are not capable of discerning that from the title, only then may you read the summary. Reading the article is only reserved for picking out additional points to backup your original claim, not to invalidate Slashdot's wisdom. And that would never happen because Slashdot's wisdom is never wrong in the first place.
Apple and Google are bad... but did you know that OSX is really UNIX and Webkit and Chrome are open source?
See, once again open source products are good for you. You should use open source products!
I hope that clears things up, Bill. Please refrain from posting useless comments in the future.
Thanks,
/.
How about:
IE8, Safari, FF, iPhone All Fall At Pwn2Own
It has fewer characters.
Or, focus on one area: IE8, Safari, Firefox all Fall At Pwn2Own
And they didn't bother to mention Firefox in the description either, which clearly had enough space to include the word "Firefox."