Cenzic Identifies Latest Most Serious Web Application Vulnerabilites

WebKnowHow
Thursday, February 8, 2007; 03:35 AM

Cenzic Intelligent Analysis (CIA) research lab named the top five most serious web application vulnerabilities for the months of November and December 2006. The CIA Lab specializes in the continuous research of application vulnerabilities and the development of remediation strategies to assist customers with their web application security needs in enterprise environments.

"With over 75% of hack attacks happening at the Web application level, Cenzic's team of experts is finding an alarming increase in application-based attacks on widely-used Open Source technologies including PHP and osCommerce as well as well-established web technologies such as Sun, ColdFusion and IBM WebSphere," said Tom Stracener, senior security analyst for Cenzic CIA Labs. "In other words, no site is safe."

Cenzic's CIA Lab evaluates a wide range of newly discovered application vulnerabilities and prioritizes them based on their severity and potential to impact regulatory compliance, internal policy compliance, information privacy and financial losses. This information is released on a monthly or bi-monthly basis and can be used by enterprises as a first step in addressing the security of custom and commercial web applications.

Upon notification enterprises generally take action to remove the vulnerability, alert impacted users and, if necessary, release security fixes or upgrades.

The CIA team analyzed all web application security vulnerabilities discovered in November and December and named the following as the top five most serious vulnerabilities for this time period:

1. PHP - Multiple Buffer Overflows

[CIA-1070-Alert]

CVE Reference:

CVE-2006-5465

http://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?name=CVE-2006-5465

Several high-risk security issues were recently disclosed in versions of the PHP prior to 5.2.0. PHP is a widely used general-purpose scripting language used in Web development. Issues include multiple integer and heap overflows that allow the execution of arbitrary code were disclosed in various PHP versions. Sites running a version of PHP prior to 5.2.0 should upgrade to the 5.2.0 release as soon as possible. Sites using vulnerable versions of PHP should upgrade to the latest stable release of PHP, 5.2.0, which is available from the vendor: http://www.php.net.

2. osCommerce - Multiple Vulnerabilities

[CIA-1071-Alert]

CVE Reference:

CVE-2006-6534

http://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?name=CVE-2006-6534

CVE-2006-6533

http://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?name=CVE-2006-6533

Several high-risk security issues were recently disclosed for osCommerce, including the risk of allowing a malicious user to conduct Cross-Site Scripting (XSS) attacks or read arbitrary files on the server. osCommerce is the leading Open Source online shop e-commerce solution with over 125,000 users worlwide and runs on any PHP-enabled web server. Vulnerabilities have been disclosed in osCommerce version 2.2 Milestone 2 Update 060817. Users should upgrade to a version of osCommerce containing a security fix as soon as such a version becomes available.

3. IBM WebSphere Application Server - Input Validation Vulnerability

[CIA-1072-Alert]

CVE Reference:

CVE-2006-2431

http://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?name=CVE-2006-2431

An input validation vulnerability in the IBM WebSphere Application Server versions 6.X allows an attacker to conduct Cross-Site Scripting (XSS) attacks. Without the new patch, an attacker could attack legitimate users of the server by redirecting users to arbitrary websites, steal user cookies, or otherwise exploit browser flaws. Affected sites should apply APAR PK16602, available from the IBM support Web site, to eliminate the vulnerability.

4. Sun Java System Technology - Request Smuggling Vulnerabilities

[CIA-1073-Alert]

HTTP Request Smuggling vulnerabilities were discovered in multiple versions of the Sun Java System Web server, application server, Web server and proxy server. HTTP Request Smuggling vulnerabilities allow an attacker to remote tamper with the HTTP response content of a vulnerable platform, facilitating a range of attacks including content spoofing, phishing, server cache poisoning and manipulation, and variations of script injection attacks. Sites running an affected version should apply the appropriate security fix from Sun available from the link below.

http://sunsolve.sun.com/search/document.do?assetkey=1-26-102733-1

5. Adobe ColdFusion - Multiple Vulnerabilities

[CIA-1074-Alert]

CVE Reference:

CVE-CVE-2006-6276

http://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?name=CVE-2006-6276

Several vulnerabilities were disclosed in ColdFusion MX 7 that allows an attacker to conduct Cross-Site Scripting (XSS) attacks, as well as discover other information about the ColdFusion server and network configuration. Affected users should apply the security fix from Adobe.

About The CIA Lab's Ratings

Cenzic's CIA Lab uses a proprietary formula for calculating the severity of vulnerability information. Cenzic's risk metrics are subject to change without notice. The vulnerabilities selected for this alert were chosen due to one or more of the following factors:

--  Origin: the vulnerability could be exploited by unauthenticated remote
    users;
--  Boundary: the vulnerability would allow privilege escalation upon a
    successful attack;
--  Popularity: the software is widely used or deployed; and
--  Criticality: the vulnerability fits the profile of the critical areas
    identified by OWASP, CSI, SANS, or other sources.
   

That a particular vulnerability is rated as severe does not imply negligence on the part of the author/maintainer/vendor of the affected software.

Cenzic has taken immediate steps to ensure that users of Cenzic Hailstorm are proactively alerted against these and other serious security vulnerabilities. CIA monitors security vulnerability information as it is released to ensure that Hailstorm provides up-to-date, comprehensive, detection and remediation of the most severe application security vulnerabilities. For more information, please visit Cenzic's CIA website at http://www.cenzic.com/cia_research/.

About Cenzic Intelligent Analysis (CIA) Research

The Cenzic Intelligent Analysis (CIA) team specializes in continuous research into application vulnerabilities and the latest tools and techniques used within the field of application security. The CIA team monitors the latest vulnerabilities and trends affecting application security by tracking Internet newsgroups, forums, mailing lists, and underground websites where vulnerability information is released, In addition to its research focus, CIA experts also perform vulnerability assessment, penetration testing, and security testing.

Cenzic has dedicated experts whose sole job is to perform ongoing research to not only analyze known vulnerabilities but also discover new or undisclosed vulnerabilities in custom, commercial, and open-source applications, and to make this information available to customers and to the community at large in the form of publications and security alerts. Cenzic Hailstorm is updated similar to anti-virus on a regular basis with new vulnerability information to give customers an advantage in staying ahead of new vulnerabilities.

About Cenzic, Inc.

Cenzic, www.cenzic.com, is a leading provider of the next-generation enterprise software and a leading Managed Service offering for application security assessment and risk management that allows Fortune 1000 corporations, mid-sized corporations, and government organizations to dramatically improve the security of web applications. Cenzic solutions are the most accurate, comprehensive, and extensible in the industry. With its flagship Hailstorm product line that includes Hailstorm Starter, Hailstorm Core, Hailstorm Professional, Hailstorm Enterprise ARC (Application Risk Controller) and the ClickToSecure managed service (SaaS), Cenzic is the only company in the industry to offer a complete application security assessment suite for enterprises of all sizes. Cenzic's current focus includes financial services, high tech, e-retail, healthcare, and government sectors.