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Archive for the ‘Computer Security’ Category

Google’s Browser Security Handbook

January 11th, 2009

Google came up with a Browser Security Handbook recently to provide web application developers, browser engineers, and information security researchers with a one-stop reference to key security properties of contemporary web browsers.

It explains most of the security aspects of internet, specification and the different browsers implementation on those specifications.

The handbook is actually an online webpages covering the following three main parts:

It’s a good read for web application developers, web application security teams or even learning hackers.

Some interesting findings:

IP Address:

Did you know that the standards for URL allows them to be presented in many ways?

Try this: 74.125.19.99 can be written in ambiguous ways such as 74.0x7d.023.99. Put into your browser url: http://74.0x7d.023.99 and it’s the same as http://74.125.19.99!!

Proprietary URL schemes:

Some browsers implement their own URL schemes other that the likes of ‘http’, ‘https’, ‘ftp’.

Eg, You can do a view-source:http://www.google.com.my/in the Firefox URL bar.

Other proprietary URL schemes includes: feed, hcp, its, mhtml, mk, ms-help, ms-its, ms-itss, jar, view-cache, wyciwyg

There are many other interesting sides of the browser security and it is a compilation of many years of hard work from the various experts. So it’s definitely a good and beneficial read!

The Browser Security handbook is written and maintained by Michal Zalewski <lcamtuf@google.com>

Computer Security, Google, Internet

Vulnerability in Internet Explorer Could Allow Remote Code Execution

December 17th, 2008

Read the original Microsoft Security Advisory (961051) here.

I received the link from a friend and the advisory is an acknowledgment from Microsoft that there is vulnerability a.k.a. “bug” in the new Internet Explorer 7.

Systems affected:

Attacks are only against Windows Internet Explorer 7 on supported editions of Windows XP Service Pack 2, Windows XP Service Pack 3, Windows Server 2003 Service Pack 1, Windows Server 2003 Service Pack 2, Windows Vista, Windows Vista Service Pack 1, and Windows Server 2008. Microsoft Internet Explorer 5.01 Service Pack 4, Microsoft Internet Explorer 6 Service Pack 1, Microsoft Internet Explorer 6, and Windows Internet Explorer 8 Beta 2 on all supported versions of Microsoft Windows are potentially vulnerable.

Basically it means IE 7 running on any version of Microsoft OS or any Service Pack (for a typical home user)?

While I found that the explanation in the web page or advisory is composed as if I was served a legal letter, I was not able to find the most important question in my mind. “How will i be vulnerable? Which actions will make me risking my computer?”

The question was only answered when I expand the Frequently Asked Questions link.

How could an attacker exploit this vulnerability?
An attacker could host a specially crafted Web site that is designed to exploit this vulnerability through Internet Explorer and then convince a user to view the Web site. The attacker could also take advantage of compromised Web sites and Web sites that accept or host user-provided content or advertisements. These Web sites could contain specially crafted content that could exploit this vulnerability. In all cases, however, an attacker would have no way to force users to visit these Web sites. Instead, an attacker would have to convince users to visit the Web site, typically by getting them to click a link in an e-mail message or in an Instant Messenger message that takes users to the attacker’s Web site. It could also be possible to display specially crafted Web content by using banner advertisements or by using other methods to deliver Web content to affected systems.

In short, I might get into trouble as long as I visit a website which know of this vulnerability, from link or even banner advertisement.

Which of the workarounds should I apply to my system in order to be protected?
Based on our investigation, setting the Internet zone security setting to High will protect users from known attacks. However, for the most effective protection, customers should evaluate a combination of using the High security setting in conjunction with one of the following workarounds.

In short, you might as well do not use IE. 😀

Computer Security, Internet, Technology , ,

Send virus to your friends

December 2nd, 2008

Skills Level: Not required

Nowadays, it’s so easy for you to catch a virus on the internet than to catch a flu!

Plus, you can infect all your friends or contacts while doing it. 😉 Not so often for you to spread flu to others right?

The next time you see something like this:

MSN Virus

Do not think twice, click on it, follow through and you’re done! You might just:

1) Get a virus ‘planted’ into your computer; or

2) See a page asking your your login or password to a website; or

3) See a spam advertisements; or

4) All of the above

 

Alright, enough of being a super bad guy. It’s so easy to determine/think something fishy is going on right?

How often do you get a friend just giving you a link and go offline right after that? Notice the just went offline there?

Never ever click on links in instant messenger unless you’re able to verify the person at the other end is really sending you the link.

I’m not kidding, it is just as simple as clicking on the link and you even risk getting someone to control your computer, format it even!

So, NEVER NEVER EVER click on ANY links unless you know it’s safe!

Computer Security, Internet , , ,