Slashdot Mirror

← Back to Stories (view on slashdot.org)

MS: Windows Phone 8 Wi-Fi Vulnerable, Cannot Be Patched

Posted by timothy on from the is-there-a-workaround-for-the-workaround? dept.

Freshly Exhumed writes "Microsoft advises that a cryptographic problem in the PEAP-MS-CHAPv2 protocol used in Windows Phone 8 to provide WPA2 authentication allows a victim's encrypted domain credentials to be collected by an attacker posing as a typical WiFi access point. Redmond further states that this problem cannot be patched, although a set of manually entered configuration changes involving root certificates on all WP8 phones and on WiFi access points will apparently address the issue. WP7.8 phones are likewise vulnerable."

2 of 146 comments (clear)

  1. Oh please by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Informative

    Every phone which implements CHAPv2 is vulnerable, because that's a broken algorithm. You can't patch it, because then it wouldn't be that algorithm anymore and stop working with other implementations of the algorithm. The right thing to do is to encapsulate it in a securely encrypted tunnel, but to have that, you have to check the certificates. If you don't secure the tunnel, an attacker can MITM you and crack the CHAPv2 inside. Not properly securing tunnels is a problem everywhere.

  2. Re:Why can't it be patched? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Informative

    because the root certificate being installed is for the internal domain and Microsoft doesn't have that certificate.

    please note: this is only for PEAP using domain credentials. not standard WPA2-PSK that just about everyone uses.