Full Disclosure mailing list archives
Re: interesting?
From: Simon Richter <Simon.Richter () hogyros de>
Date: Sat, 1 Feb 2003 17:03:40 +0100
Hi,
So what we have witnessed is the structured approach. The question remains whether the worm author is a maths wizard or just plain lucky.
Using a random distribution is the best no-brainer way to make sure having 500 worms will produce a 500 times wider coverage.
No, with a truly random pattern they will step on each other's toes.
PS:what you're describing looks like a pseudo random generator ... doesn't look like a structured approach.
It may very well be one, or just luck. Point is, you can optimize PRNGs in a specific direction, like number of cycles contained, or you can add external elements like the time and make a function that's not bijective (which is necessary for a worm) etc. A worm is more effective if less bits depend on the time and more on the host we're on, as this distributes the attack better. On the other hand, if all bits depend on the current host, you have a PRNG with only one cycle that gets broken by the first host not running SQL Server. You need to find a good balance, respecting the percentage and distribution of hosts running vulnerable software and of course the fact that the system clock proceeds very slow and thus you can use only a few bits of it (but basically, these bits together with maybe, a counter, make up the redundancy you need to infect an entire network even if some hosts are not vulnerable).
Do you have a link to that generator description?
It was posted a few days ago on this list. Archive link is http://lists.netsys.com/pipermail/full-disclosure/2003-January/003718.html Simon -- GPG Fingerprint: 040E B5F7 84F1 4FBC CEAD ADC6 18A0 CC8D 5706 A4B4
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Current thread:
- interesting? batz (Jan 31)
- Re: interesting? Berend-Jan Wever (Feb 01)
- Re: interesting? Ka (Feb 01)
- Re: interesting? Simon Richter (Feb 01)
- Re: interesting? Simon Marechal (Feb 01)
- Re: interesting? Simon Richter (Feb 01)
- Re: interesting? Simon Marechal (Feb 01)
- Re: interesting? Roland Postle (Feb 01)
- Re: interesting? Geoincidents (Feb 01)
- Re: interesting? Simon Marechal (Feb 01)
- Re: interesting? Berend-Jan Wever (Feb 01)
- Re: interesting? batz (Feb 01)
- Re: interesting? Gregory Steuck (Feb 01)
- Re: interesting? batz (Feb 01)
- Re: interesting? Bruce Ediger (Feb 01)