Dropbox Password Goof Let Any Password Work For 4 Hours

tekgoblin writes "Dropbox confirmed today that for some time yesterday, any user's account was accessible without a password. The glitch was a programming error related to a code update and accounts were only vulnerable from around 1:54 pm PST to 5:46pm PST." "Only" is relative; as reader zonky puts it, "It took around 4 hours from deployment for Dropbox to notice they'd entirely broken their authentication scheme."

Comments

Regression testing

[Bogtha]

This is why automated regression testing is a best practice. I guess Dropbox don't test their authentication.

Re:Regression testing

[buchner.johannes]

This is why automated regression testing is a best practice. I guess Dropbox don't test their authentication.

That would be so oldschool. We do agile development now, and the user is the tester once the unit-tests pass.

</sarcasm>

Re:Regression testing

[Richard_at_work]

No, they have never claimed that the password was involved in the encryption they use - they use one single encryption key for all data stored. Their terms of service did say that your data is inaccessible without your password, but this is nothing more than permissions rather than per-account encryption.

There has been lots of valid shit thrown around about Dropbox over the recent weeks, but please do try and get stuff right before you complain.

Re:Regression testing

[Nikker]

This is Slashdot, the start tag was posted in 1999.

Re:Regression testing

[Richard_at_work]

Again, no - its been well documented that Dropbox does global deduplication and single instance storage, across all data in their database. That would not work anywhere near as well for them if each account used its own encryption key - until they turned it off recently due to abuse, you could shove an Ubuntu iso into your local Dropbox and have it "synced" 100% in seconds, as the Dropbox servers realise that they already have it in their global pool, and simply tell your client not to upload it.

So yes, they use a single key.

Re:Regression testing

[gstoddart]

Well, gee, that makes me feel good about their security...

I've never treated Dropbox like it's secure. It's convenient for copying around files, but I wouldn't use it for anything sensitive.

I think if you're aware of the fact that it's only *slightly* more secure than a public folder on a shared network and use it accordingly, you can still make use of Dropbox as a tool. Although, admittedly, my usage of it has diminished since I initially got it.

Relax, it was only 4 hours.

[Combatso]

Relax honey, I only left our baby alone in the bathtub for four hours.
Relax Mr. President, We only let our enemy control our nuclear arsenal for four hours
Relax Japan, we have enough battery backup for the cooling system for four hours
Relax Gulf Residents, it's only been spilling oil for four hours
Relax Public, the serial killer has only been escaped for four hours
Relax Columbine Parents, the killing spree and stand off only lasted for four hours

Re:Relax, it was only 4 hours.

[xtracto]

but fortunately there is no evidence of any unauthorized access.

Of course not, all the access where authorized by the faulty authorization system.

The Most Interesting Developer In The World

[Kozz]

I don't test my code. But when I do, I do it in Production,