Dark Reading is part of the Informa Tech Division of Informa PLC

This site is operated by a business or businesses owned by Informa PLC and all copyright resides with them.Informa PLC's registered office is 5 Howick Place, London SW1P 1WG. Registered in England and Wales. Number 8860726.

Database Security
Authentication
Mobile
Privacy
Compliance
Careers and People
Identity & Access Management
Security Monitoring
Advanced Threats
Insider Threats
Vulnerability Management
Comments
Apple: Majority Of Mac OS X Users Not At Risk To 'Shellshock'
Oldest First  |  Newest First  |  Threaded View
Robert McDougal
50%
50%
Robert McDougal,
 User Rank: Ninja
9/28/2014 | 12:48:25 PM
Apple is attempting to minimize.
True, in order to be vulnerable to a remote execution you need to enable some inbound service, such as SSH.  However, the fact is that ALL versions of OSX have the vulnerability.  In my testing, every version of OSX, including the beta of Yosemite, have proved to be vulnerable.

I know Apple hasn't had to deal with major vulnerabilities routinely in the past, but this isn't the way to address it.  Apple should admit that all versions of OSX have the vulnerability but, users are not exposed unless they enable X, Y or Z.  They shouldn't leave the subject up for debate by making a nebulous statement such as "systems are safe by default and not exposed to remote exploits of Bash unless users configure advanced UNIX services".  This doesn't actually explain to users how they might currently be vulnerable, or what they may do for a work around.

Apple gets an F for this response in my book.

 
RyanSepe
50%
50%
RyanSepe,
 User Rank: Ninja
9/29/2014 | 9:12:11 AM
Re: Apple is attempting to minimize.
Very good point Robert. I think even if there is the possibility of a vulnerable configuration within your hardware that you need to account for it. How difficult would it be for Apple to design a quick app to check if the system settings you have on your Mac are vulnerable? 

The answer is not very difficult at all if it is just a series of enables/disables. If enabled true if not than false. A quick scan should be made available for all OSX users. I think it isn't too lofty of a request considered that this vulnerability was given the highest severity rating possible by NIST.
securityaffairs
50%
50%
securityaffairs,
 User Rank: Ninja
9/29/2014 | 11:02:09 AM
Re: Apple is attempting to minimize.
I agree, OS X is anyway affected by the Bash bug flaw and its announcement is giving a fake sense of security to many people that aren't able to check their systems.
theb0x
50%
50%
theb0x,
 User Rank: Ninja
9/29/2014 | 9:26:22 PM
Re: Apple is attempting to minimize.
The following conditions must be true in OSX to exploit the system:

1) Root must be enabled. The setting is pretty well hidden and the user must knowly access it. (System default is disabled in latest OSX.)

2) A local terminal session must be spawned with the following command followed by root password:

sudo systemsetup -setremotelogin on

This enables the SSH Daemon. How many average Apple users do you think have configured their systems this way? At this point I see this as nothing more than a social engineering attack for these system conditions to be true for most users. Unless they know what SSH is because they're a Sys Admin. I am not taking sides with Apple. Their security responses are a joke and always make me chuckle.
securityaffairs
50%
50%
securityaffairs,
 User Rank: Ninja
9/30/2014 | 2:38:52 AM
Re: Apple is attempting to minimize.
I agree theb0x!


Commentary
Ransomware Is Not the Problem
Adam Shostack, Consultant, Entrepreneur, Technologist, Game Designer,  6/9/2021
Edge-DRsplash-11-edge-ask-the-experts
How Can I Test the Security of My Home-Office Employees' Routers?
John Bock, Senior Research Scientist,  6/7/2021
News
New Ransomware Group Claiming Connection to REvil Gang Surfaces
Jai Vijayan, Contributing Writer,  6/10/2021
Register for Dark Reading Newsletters
White Papers
Video
Cartoon Contest
Write a Caption, Win an Amazon Gift Card! Click Here
Latest Comment: This gives a new meaning to blind leading the blind.
Current Issue
The State of Cybersecurity Incident Response
In this report learn how enterprises are building their incident response teams and processes, how they research potential compromises, how they respond to new breaches, and what tools and processes they use to remediate problems and improve their cyber defenses for the future.
Flash Poll
Twitter Feed
Dark Reading - Bug Report
Bug Report
Enterprise Vulnerabilities
From DHS/US-CERT's National Vulnerability Database
CVE-2021-28815
PUBLISHED: 2021-06-16
Insecure storage of sensitive information has been reported to affect QNAP NAS running myQNAPcloud Link. If exploited, this vulnerability allows remote attackers to read sensitive information by accessing the unrestricted storage mechanism. This issue affects: QNAP Systems Inc. myQNAPcloud Link vers...
CVE-2021-3535
PUBLISHED: 2021-06-16
Rapid7 Nexpose is vulnerable to a non-persistent cross-site scripting vulnerability affecting the Security Console's Filtered Asset Search feature. A specific search criterion and operator combination in Filtered Asset Search could have allowed a user to pass code through the provided search field. ...
CVE-2021-32685
PUBLISHED: 2021-06-16
tEnvoy contains the PGP, NaCl, and PBKDF2 in node.js and the browser (hashing, random, encryption, decryption, signatures, conversions), used by TogaTech.org. In versions prior to 7.0.3, the `verifyWithMessage` method of `tEnvoyNaClSigningKey` always returns `true` for any signature that has a SHA-5...
CVE-2021-32623
PUBLISHED: 2021-06-16
Opencast is a free and open source solution for automated video capture and distribution. Versions of Opencast prior to 9.6 are vulnerable to the billion laughs attack, which allows an attacker to easily execute a (seemingly permanent) denial of service attack, essentially taking down Opencast using...
CVE-2021-32676
PUBLISHED: 2021-06-16
Nextcloud Talk is a fully on-premises audio/video and chat communication service. Password protected shared chats in Talk before version 9.0.10, 10.0.8 and 11.2.2 did not rotate the session cookie after a successful authentication event. It is recommended that the Nextcloud Talk App is upgraded to 9...