Full Disclosure mailing list archives

Re: AOL refuses to help AIM users


From: ATD <simon () snosoft com>
Date: 03 Feb 2003 21:45:28 -0500

Juraj,
        I would love to make it public however I am not sure as to what the
actual vulnerability is. What I do know is that it allowed a the
attacker to "take over" the users account.  In the process the attacker
was able to change the users password. The users client was GAIM, I am
not sure of the version as of yet. The perplexing/concerning part of
this is they did not require the user to be on-line for the account
compromise.  They can apparently change the password on the AIM database
whenever they want, which makes me wonder if it has been compromised.
Like I said, AOL was not interested in discussing this with me, even
after I identified myself. Their clam was because I was not a paying
customer. 

        Also take note, my last message and this one are both being carbon
copied to both toc () aol com and abuse () aol com, but to no avail.



On Mon, 2003-02-03 at 21:39, Juraj Bednar wrote:
Hello,


  make the vulnerability public, static why you did not communicate with
  vendor. It's their problem. Would be pretty bad press for them.


   J.

All,
    Has anyone on this list ever tried to report a security issue to AOL? I
just tried to do that and was literally told, "Corporate policy states
that we do not help our free users.". I said, "I suppose thats because
you don't make any money off of the free users".  The man on the other
end of the line being their security expert then stated, "thats right".
Is this how they treat their prospective clients, end users, and free
users? What can we do about this?

-- 
ATD <simon () snosoft com>
Secure Network Operations, Inc.
-- 
ATD <simon () snosoft com>
Secure Network Operations, Inc.

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