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Microsoft Spurned Researchers Release 0-Day
nk497 notes the news that a group of researchers calling themselves the Microsoft-Spurned Researcher Collective (the name is a play on Microsoft's Security Response Center) have come together to protest Microsoft's perceived heavy-handedness towards researchers who disclose security flaws. Pushed into action by the reception to the flaw disclosed by Tavis Ormandy, the group has released full details and exploit code for a previously unknown Windows local privilege escalation vulnerability. The advisory for the vulnerability, which affects Windows Vista and Windows Server 2008, contains the following manifesto: "Due to hostility toward security researchers, the most recent example being of Tavis Ormandy, a number of us from the industry (and some not from the industry) have come together to form MSRC: the Microsoft-Spurned Researcher Collective. MSRC will fully disclose vulnerability information discovered in our free time, free from retaliation against us or any inferred employer."
Perhaps being a little more... Diplomatic would be a good idea when dealing with the(sometimes rather ego-driven) people who know how to hack your box...
MS has to test stuff to make sure the fix doesn't make things worse. Decisions get made, people don't like the outcome. But recklessly announcing security holes is just dumb, and isn't helping anyone.
fail.
I think that their point, regardless of its validity, is that when people go to Microsoft and say "I've found this vulnerability, here's the detail and PoC, please fix it", they often sit on it for weeks, months or sometimes years before they take any action.
Now, I appreciate that MS can't turn on a dime like some smaller companies and they have a shitload of regression testing and QA to do, but in the cases where highly critical bugs have been known about for years and persisted into *new* versions of OSs and Applications, you can understand why people get upset.
The first thing that came to my mind was: "What a group of immature jerks."
They tried that, it did not work so now they do this.
What should they do when "responsible" disclosure gets you either a prompt STFU, the just ignore the problem or worstcase a lawsuit?
Use responsible disclosure and not only Microsoft, but above all the users of Windows will like you.
Expose them to an unpatched vulnerability and they will love you, uh, less.
The generally accepted practice is to disclose the vulnerability to the publisher first, and give them 30 days to issue a fix. If there is no fix available after the waiting period, THEN you disclose it to the general public. Although I'm sure the length of the waiting period can be a source of much debate, I don't believe making vulnerabilities public before giving the publisher a chance to fix the problem is in the best interest of computer users.
I've abandoned my search for truth; now I'm just looking for some useful delusions.
They can. But when this has been done in the past, no matter the time limit given, Microsoft has publicly chastised them for it. The result is this news article.
"If you make people think they're thinking, they'll love you; But if you really make them think, they'll hate you." - DM
The real bad guys most certainly knows about these security issues long before they becomes common knowledge. Responsible would be Microsoft patching their stuff as soon as they learn about an exploit instead of waiting for the known ones to be spread in the wild.
Responsible disclosure is just Microsofts way of trying to get people to shut up about their crappy security. If Microsoft was the least interested in security they would care more about real security than UAC (put the blame on the user) and playing statistics by making more secure products, hiding patches and grouping patches etc.
HTTP/1.1 400
The name researcher gave them 5 days to fix a vulnerability. Even today, no easy solution for that has been found and the said "security researcher" (paid by Google) really released the exploit publicly. Since then it has been exploited. So you STFU.
They didn't try anything. They got there feelings hurt cause people are mad at there friend. They did not give MS a chance, they said you were mean so we will destructively release this cause we are mad. And it get used to hurt people I think this group should get there asses sued. Just like the big ego-ed big babies they are. All releasing an exploit does is give the finder cred and that is what they want. If they were good people they would never release an exploit just tell the vendor and that is it. I like how people rationalize it, I gave them 30 days. Well somethings can't be fixed in 30 days or even 30 weeks. People just wanna say I found it look at me..... And that is what makes them crappy people.
It seems like the lesson has to be relearned periodically.
This same debate reappears like sunspots. Full Disclosure v. Responsible Disclosure. Black/Gray/White hats.
The funny part here is that Microsoft itself seems to have forgotten how the script goes.
MS, Sun, Oracle, Cisco, HP, they've all been through this cycle. You'd think they'd figure out that mission critical software requires a responsive, competent security response team. And they do figure it out. It just seems that the lesson has to be relearned every so often - prying the PRarnicles off the hull, so to speak.
I forget what 8 was for.
Narrow minded bullshit.
The stories and info posted here are artistic works of fiction and falsehood.
Only fools would take it as fact.
what prevents a security flaw from getting fixed? $$$
What causes security flaws to be released ? $$$
Assuming that is mostly accurate, I would then postulate that microsoft protects their profits at the expense of an acceptable amount of security flaws (among a bunch of other stuff)
A new patch released by my company leaves our servers traveling at 60 Internets per second. A 0-day exploit is published. The computer crashes and burns with everyone trapped inside. Now, should we patch the exploit?? Take the number of unpatched systems in the field, A, multiply by the probable rate of failure, B, multiply by the average out-of-court settlement, C. A times B times C equals X. If X is less than the cost of patching the exploit, we don't patch it.
- Tyler Durden
Floor Manager, Microsoft's Security Response Center
Random Thoughts From A Diseased Mind (Not For Dummies)
Or, how about the reward is that you acted responsibly, doing what you thought was the right thing. Can't that be enough?
"The only reward of virtue is virtue." - Ralph Waldo Emerson
Disclosure of vulnerabilities is the only way to get them fixed.
Surely the thousands of other fixed bugs proves that this is statement wrong.
On top of that, how does a "security researcher" validate their claims of finding bugs if they don't release them?
Because software companies want to encourage people to report security bugs to them so they can get fixed before being exploited. It is in Microsoft's interest to acknowledge the security professionals who report the bugs. They also acknowledge the third parties who assist in solving bugs too.
If a researcher gives a week/2 week notice, then releases their information -- as far as I'm concerned their clear
But what if Microsoft are currently spending their time fixing a major security hole that is currently being exploited. Isn't it reasonable for them to prioritise that over some newly discovered bug that nobody knows about just because some hacker wants their 15 minutes of fame immediately?
If someone notices a problem in Microsoft's {insert function here} code, perhaps {Another company} with similar code has the same vulnerability, and would benefit from the knowledge?
It is far more likely that it will be Microsoft that finds similar code with the same vulnerability in other products which would need to be fixed by the same bug fix. There is a reason why it can take more than a week to find and fix a bug.
Not being able to fix the problem is very different from not being able to do anything to mitigate your exposure to the problem.
Sometimes the problem is part of an unused component that can be turned off.
Sometimes the problem can be protected by simple firewall rule changes.
Sometimes the problem has a simple work-around.
All of these things help protect the user even though none of them actually fix the problem.
If the user doesn't know the problem exists, then they can't make any attempt to protect themselves.
*sigh* back to work...