Re: CR II - winME? confirmation? (Slightly OT)

["Michael J. Cannon" <mcannon () ubiquicomm com>]

In Win2K, hit "<CTRL>-<ALT>-<DEL>" (the three-finger M$ salute), and the
System Control Panel comes up...press "<T>ask Manager"  Select the
"Processes" tab, by mousing over and left-clicking it, and then press the
"Image Name" button.

Over 80% of my W2K Pro clients' desktops show 'inetinfo.exe' as a running
process, although Web Services are disabled.  Many programs take advantage
of the IIS server and aren't nice enough to ask for permission (just as many
programs install IIS 4 on NT Workstation and don't ask).

Bottom line:  if there's a patch for your OS version or any client you could
possibly be running (SNA Server, SQL Server, various O2K apps,
Exchange...name it, it goes on forever) apply the patch.  Otherwise YOU are
responsible for the consequences.

The horrendously idiotic and unprofessional VB and VC++ developers and
"engineers" in Microsoft proper and in the M$ development community use .dll
files, such as the one Code Red exploits, and do not ask the user's
permission to do so.  Granted, with the intelligence of the majority of
Windows users, it's doubtful most would be able to make an informed
decisison even if they WERE asked, but they should be asked.  For instance,
if you have installed any number of IDEs or Network Intrusion Detection
software for Windows, chances are, that's where the IIS server came from.

What's REALLY stupid, is that these same developers and OS vendors ask us,
as security professionals, to keep track of their ridiculous efforts at
'software engineering,' while continuing to release the same buggy,
virtually inoperable, insecure code.

Plain English:  They (including Microsoft and te Windows dev community)
release buggy, insecure code on purpose and then blame us when we can't
'secure' it.  You cannot secure what was inherently insecure in the first
place.

Mike
----- Original Message -----
From: "kam" <kam () aversion net>
To: "Amer Karim" <amerk () telus net>; "VULN-DEV List"
<VULN-DEV () securityfocus com>
Sent: Tuesday, August 07, 2001 12:35 PM
Subject: Re: CR II - winME? confirmation? (Slightly OT)


> Without IIS running, an attacker has no means of exploiting the vulnerable
> file. With no access to the file, the vulnerability does not exist. If
> they're running IIS, then there is a hole which they can exploit. Even
> though it comes installed by default on 2000, it's not a risk until you
turn
> on your web services.
>
> kam
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "Amer Karim" <amerk () telus net>
> To: "VULN-DEV List" <VULN-DEV () SECURITYFOCUS COM>
> Sent: Tuesday, August 07, 2001 10:03 AM
> Subject: Re: CR II - winME? confirmation? (Slightly OT)
>
>
> > Hi All,
> >
> > All the advisories about CR state that only IIS servers are vulnerable.
> > However, it's my understanding that the unchecked buffer in idq.dll was
> the
> > source of that vulnerability.  If that's the case, then why have the
> > advisories not included Win2K systems (all flavours) since idq.dll is
> > installed by default as part of the indexing service on all these
> systems -
> > regardless of whether they are using the service or not?  Wouldn't that
> make
> > ANY system with the indexing service on it just as vulnerable as systems
> > with IIS? Am I overlooking something obvious here?
> >
> > Regards,
> > Amer Karim
> > Nautilis Information Systems
> > e-mail: amerk () telus net, mamerk () hotmail com