Re: Microsoft Windows Vista/2003/XP/2000 file management security issues

[Tim <tim-security () sentinelchicken org>]

> Pardon me for maybe being a little na?ve here, but the situation you state: 
>
> "I have conducted code reviews on several commercial apps which use C:\TEMP in very insecure ways to store sensitive 
> data."  
>
> That would certainly seem to me that a programmer and the QA process
> failed.  I struggle to see where Windows is to blame for that.  I am no
> "Windows lover" but as a working security professional, I see as much
> poorly written code junking up Linux, Unix, Apples (yes we have them
> all) as I see with Windows, yet in those situations, will you blame the
> OS there too?  I think it is time you take the bias you have, set it
> aside and look at the statement you made which was concise, accurate and
> factual, then point the blame where it belongs; at the code writers
> whose code you review!.

No, I never said I blame Windows for a poorly written app such as this.
Don't jump to conclusions.

Many developers might think using predictable filenames in TEMP might be
ok, since Windows doesn't (yet) have issues related to symlink attacks.
However, ZARAZA has shown a few ways to exploit this lame practice
anyway, beyond just a DoS.  That's all I'm saying.

tim

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