Microsoft: SSL flaw is in OS not IE

[InfoSec News <isn () c4i org>]

http://www.nwfusion.com/news/2002/0814msflaw.html

By John Fontana
Network World Fusion, 08/14/02 

Microsoft said Wednesday that the SSL flaw recently uncovered by an
independent researcher is in multiple versions of the Windows
operating system and not its Internet Explorer Web browser.

Company officials added that the flaw also is not in Microsoft's
CryptoAPI (CAPI), which would leave a number of applications and
Windows services vulnerable, not just IE.

Microsoft said it is working on patches for Windows 98, ME, NT4, 2000
and XP. It would not say when the patches would be available.

"This SSL flaw has been described as an [Internet Explorer] problem
but it is a Windows issue. It's in the crypto of the operating system
so we have to patch the OS," said Scott Culp manager of the Microsoft
Security Response Center. "IE is a consumer of those crypto services."

He said it is an "implementation problem in the way SSL certificates
are processed where information is not available in the certificate or
it is available in two places and there is a conflict."

Culp said the flaw does not lie within CAPI and that it lies in code
that performs validation of SSL certificate chains, meaning the
hierarchy of trust that cascades from certificate authorities such as
VeriSign. The OS must be patched because IE does not have its own
cryptography code and must rely on the OS for that service, he said.

Konqueror.org was able to patch its open source Konqueror Web browser,
which had the same SSL flaw as IE, in under 90 minutes because it uses
its own built-in certification verification library.

Microsoft officials said it makes sense for the OS to provide
cryptographic services to any application that needs it instead of
each application having to include it's own cryptographic technology.

But Culp said the SSL flaw does not effect any other application
outside IE and that it is a client side issue only.

"That's interesting, I'll have to do some more testing," said Mike
Benham, an independent researcher who first reported the SSL flaw.  
"Possibly this is a second can of worms."

Benham reported on Tuesday that Internet Explorer had a security flaw
that undermines the security provided by Secure Socket Layer (SSL), a
standard for securing online transactions and electronic commerce.

The flaw opens up a vulnerability that is called a man-in-the-middle
attack, where the attacker can hijack an SSL session and decrypt
messages that could contain credit card numbers or social security
numbers.



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