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October 21, 2009

IBM Says Web Is Insecure

Filed under: Uncategorized — Tags: computers, internet security, malicious, PDF, risk, threats, vulnerability exploitations, web — @ 2:20 pm

The IBM X-Force 2009 Mid-Year Trend and Risk Report revealed many security problems with the world wide web. The report’s findings show an unprecedented state of Web insecurity as Web client, server, and content threats converge posing a huge risk for web surfers. The report finds more than a 500 percent increase in malicious Web links and increased sophistication in vulnerability exploitation.

There has been a 508% increase in the number of new malicious Web links discovered in the first half of 2009. This problem is no longer limited to malicious domains or untrusted Web sites. The report notes an increase in the presence of malicious content on trusted sites, including popular search engines, blogs, bulletin boards, personal web sites, online magazines and mainstream news sites. The ability to gain access and manipulate data remains the primary consequence of vulnerability exploitations.

The report also finds that the level of veiled Web exploits, especially PDF files, are at an all time high, pointing to increased sophistication of attackers. PDF vulnerabilities disclosed in the first half of 2009 surpassed disclosures from all of 2008. From Q1 to Q2 alone, the amount of suspicious, obfuscated or concealed content monitored by the IBM ISS Managed Security Services team nearly doubled.

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October 5, 2009

Alert: Portable Document Format (PDF)

Filed under: Uncategorized — Tags: Adobe, alert, exploit, PDF, safety, security, vulnerability — @ 2:21 am

by Art Manion

Adobe Reader and Acrobat JavaScript vulnerabilities

Overview
Adobe Reader and Acrobat contain vulnerabilities in the customDictionaryOpen() and getAnnots() JavaScript methods.
I. Description
Adobe Reader and the Adobe Acrobat family of software is designed to create, view, and edit Portable Document Format (PDF) files. Adobe Reader is widely deployed, and the Acrobat Reader Plug-In displays PDF inside a web browser.
Adobe Reader and Acrobat support JavaScript. The JavaScript methods customDictionaryOpen() (CVE-2009-1493) and getAnnots() (CVE-2009-1492) do not safely handle specially crafted arguments and can be manipulated to execute arbitrary code. Publicly available exploit code claims to work on Adobe Reader 9.1 and 8.1.4 on GNU/Linux. Limited testing shows that Adobe Reader and Acrobat on and Microsoft Windows platforms crash when parsing a PDF file that contains a specially crafted getAnnots() call. As of 2009-04-29 we have not confirmed the reported customDictionaryOpen() vulnerability.

Adobe Security Advisory APSA09-02 states that the getAnnots() vulnerability affects Adobe Reader and Acrobat for Microsoft Windows, Apple Mac OS X, and UNIX, while the customDictionaryOpen() vulnerability appears to only affect Adobe Reader for UNIX.

II. Impact
By convincing a user to open a specially crafted PDF file, an attacker may be able to execute arbitrary code.
III. Solution
Update
From Adobe Security Bulletin APSB09-06, update to version 9.1.1, 8.1.5, or 7.1.2 of Adobe Reader and Adobe Acrobat Standard, Pro and Pro Extended.

Disable JavaScript in Adobe Reader and Acrobat

Disabling JavaScript prevents these vulnerabilities from being exploited and reduces attack surface. If this workaround is applied to updated versions of Adobe Reader and Acrobat, it may protect against future vulnerabilities.

To disable JavaScript in Adobe Reader:

Open Adobe Acrobat Reader.
Open the Edit menu.
Choose the Preferences… option.
Choose the JavaScript section.
Uncheck the Enable Acrobat JavaScript check box.
Disabling JavaScript will not resolve the vulnerabilities, it will only disable the vulnerable JavaScript component. When JavaScript is disabled, Adobe Reader and Acrobat prompt to re-enable JavaScript when opening a PDF that contains JavaScript.

Some vendors ship JavaScript support in a separate package. Removing this package may remove JavaScript support.

Prevent Internet Explorer from automatically opening PDF documents

The installer for Adobe Reader and Acrobat configures Internet Explorer to automatically open PDF files without any user interaction. This behavior can be reverted to the safer option of prompting the user by importing the following as a .REG file:

Windows Registry Editor Version 5.00

[HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\AcroExch.Document.7]
“EditFlags”=hex:00,00,00,00
Disable the displaying of PDF documents in the web browser

Preventing PDF documents from opening inside a web browser reduces attack surface. If this workaround is applied to updated versions of Adobe Reader and Acrobat, it may protect against future vulnerabilities.

To prevent PDF documents from automatically being opened in a web browser with Adobe Reader:

Open Adobe Acrobat Reader.
Open the Edit menu.
Choose the Preferences… option.
Choose the Internet section.
Uncheck the Display PDF in browser check box.
Rename or remove Annots.api

To disable the vulnerable getAnnots() method, rename or remove the Annots.api file. This will disable some Annotation functionality, however annotations can still be viewed. This does not protect against the customDictionaryOpen() vulnerability.

On Windows, Annots.api is typically located here:

“%ProgramFiles%\Adobe\Reader 9.0\Reader\plug_ins”
Example location on GNU/Linux:

/opt/Adobe/Reader8/Reader/intellinux/plug_ins/Annots.api
Do not access PDF documents from untrusted sources

Do not open unfamiliar or unexpected PDF documents, particularly those hosted on web sites or delivered as email attachments. Please see Cyber Security Tip ST04-010.
Systems Affected
Vendor Status Date Notified Date Updated
Adobe Vulnerable 2009-04-28 2009-05-13

References

http://www.adobe.com/support/security/bulletins/apsb09-06.html
http://www.adobe.com/support/security/advisories/apsa09-02.html
http://blogs.adobe.com/psirt/2009/04/potential_adobe_reader_issue.html
http://blogs.adobe.com/psirt/2009/04/update_on_adobe_reader_issue.html
http://blogs.adobe.com/psirt/2009/05/adobe_reader_issue_update.html
http://www.adobe.com/devnet/acrobat/pdfs/js_api_reference.pdf
http://www.securityfocus.com/bid/34736/
http://www.securityfocus.com/bid/34740/

Credit
These vulnerabilities were publicly reported by Arr1val.

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February 23, 2009

Adobe Acrobat and Reader Vulnerability

Filed under: Uncategorized — Tags: Adobe, internet security, PDF — @ 2:53 pm

National Cyber Alert System
Technical Cyber Security Alert TA09-051A

Systems Affected

* Adobe Reader version 9 and earlier
* Adobe Acrobat (Professional, 3D, and Standard) version 9 and earlier

Overview

Adobe has released Security Bulletin APSB09-01, which describes a vulnerability that affects Adobe Reader and Acrobat. This vulnerability could allow a remote attacker to execute arbitrary code.

I. Description

Adobe Security Bulletin APSB09-01 describes a memory-corruption vulnerability that affects Adobe Reader and Acrobat. Further details are available in Vulnerability Note VU#905281.

An attacker could exploit these vulnerabilities by convincing a user to load a specially crafted Adobe Portable Document Format (PDF) file. Acrobat integrates with popular web browsers, and visiting a website is usually sufficient to cause Acrobat to load PDF content.

II. Impact

An attacker may be able to execute arbitrary code.

III. Solution

Disable JavaScript in Adobe Reader and Acrobat

Disabling Javascript may prevent some exploits from resulting in code execution. Acrobat JavaScript can be disabled using the Preferences menu (Edit -> Preferences -> JavaScript and un-check Enable Acrobat JavaScript).

Prevent Internet Explorer from automatically opening PDF documents

Windows Registry Editor Version 5.00

[HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\AcroExch.Document.7]
“EditFlags”=hex:00,00,00,00

Disable the display of PDF documents in the web browser

Preventing PDF documents from opening inside a web browser will partially mitigate this vulnerability. If this workaround is applied it may also mitigate future vulnerabilities.

To prevent PDF documents from automatically being opened in a web browser, do the following:

1. Open Adobe Acrobat Reader.
2. Open the Edit menu.
3. Choose the preferences option.
4. Choose the Internet section.
5. Un-check the “Display PDF in browser” check box.

Do not access PDF documents from untrusted sources

Do not open unfamiliar or unexpected PDF documents, particularly those hosted on web sites or delivered as email attachments. Please see Cyber Security Tip ST04-010.

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