Forgot to say that the VP of Software Dev who is in charge of the site said he
would do an emergency fix in 6 hours to fix the problem. As I expected the
problem is still there. Either he is a moron and didn't understand me or they
just tried to give the impression they were fixing it. So sad to say site is
still vuln, reason thinking public spotlight will make them get off their ass
and actually do something productive to protect student information. At this
point I can not trust the IT staff because on 2 occasions the VPs of 2
departments lied to me about fixing the hole. I've contacted the Department Of
Higher Education and will be filing a complaint against the school. Not only is
their lack of concern about the problem disturbing, their IT administration
seems to be unqualified to deal with it either.
----- Original Message -----
From: bkfsec <bkfsec@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
To: "CrYpTiC MauleR" <crypticmauler@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Subject: Re: [Full-disclosure] Should I Be Worried?
Date: Wed, 26 Apr 2006 15:04:04 -0400
CrYpTiC MauleR wrote:
After reading http://www.securityfocus.com/news/11389 it made me
think twice about actually going public with my school's security
hole by having school notify students, parents and/or faculty at
risk due to it.
I mean I didnt access any records, just knew that it was possible
for someone to access my account or anyone elses. I did not even
exploit the hole to steal, modify etc any records. Does this
still put me in the same boat at the USC guy? If so I am really
not wanting to butt heads with the school in case they try to
turn around and bite the hand that tried to help them. Even if my
intentions were good, they might even make something up saying I
accessed entire database or something. I have nothing to prove me
otherwise since they have access to the logs. Already it seems
like the school is trying to sweep the incident under the rug, so
very wary as to what they might do if they were pushed into a
corner and forced to go public. Anyone has any idea what I can do
or should I just let this slide? I am already putting my credit
report and such on fraud alert just in case, and definelty do not
plan on attending this school after my degree or school year is
over. A transfer is better than having me risk my data.
I think you're probably jumping the gun a little bit here.
From what I gather, you approached people about the issue, you got
some resolution on it. Switching schools is not necessarily going
to help you because, believe me, every institution has problems
with regard to information leakage. If it's not technical, it's
social leakage. If you're concerned about possible problems to
yourself, then maybe full disclosure may not be appropriate. Think
about it for a second. Holes in both software and procedures are
fixed daily in any given institution. The *vast* majority of it is
never reported. And what would we really gain if it was? School A
fixes an XSS bug in their web app. Woopty freaking doooo...
School B patches their servers 2 months late, but are now up to
date... School C fires a registrar for giving out SS numbers over
the phone to unknown contacts, but not necessarily known to be
malicious... etc
Without proof of a violation of security or privacy, it doesn't
really mean much. Just having a social security number these days
is grounds for people to be concerned. This is why it was
originally against mandate for it to be used as a national ID
system.
In fact, let's take that one step further and look at the whole
financial infrastructure. It's a shambles. Not secure at all.
Anyone with the right contract can pull your credit report and
start adding accounts to your name. Be afraid, be very afraid.
But, be afraid for the right reasons. Really, the only reason you
should be thinking full disclosure now is if they didn't fix the
bug, which IIRC they did. If you're really concerned about your
privacy, that should be where it stops. Full disclosure after
fixes works with software components, not necessarily
organizations. Society as a whole is not necessarily going to
learn anything from relatively generic examples of institutions
having a security issue (which we don't even have proof of any
exploit of those issues). So best thing to do is back off for a
bit, lay low... you got a response, why keep putting yourself in
the spotlight and drawing them to you? Organizations threaten
legal action, more often than not, to shut people up. Just
consider that if that's what you're concerned about. Be subtle.
-bkfsec