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RE: The impending DDoS storm
by McBurnett, Jim 13 Aug '03

13 Aug '03

But doesn't that mean the hacker won? If you change the DNS and a user can not get to windowsupdate, you just helped him create a better DoS than he had... J -----Original Message----- From: Lloyd Taylor [mailto:ltaylor@keynote.com] Sent: Wednesday, August 13, 2003 12:26 PM To: Jack Bates Cc: nanog(a)merit.edu Subject: Re: The impending DDoS storm Does anyone have any notion of what the Blaster worm will do if the DNS lookup for "windowsupdate.com" returns NXDOMAIN? If it handles this case by not sending any micreant love, might that not be the best way to mitigate the potential damage? --Lloyd On Wed, 13 Aug 2003, Jack Bates wrote: > Date: Wed, 13 Aug 2003 11:10:13 -0500 > From: Jack Bates <jbates(a)brightok.net> > To: Jason Frisvold <friz(a)corp.ptd.net> > Cc: "Ingevaldson, Dan (ISS Atlanta)" <dsi(a)iss.net>, > Stephen J. Wilcox <steve(a)telecomplete.co.uk>, nanog(a)merit.edu > Subject: Re: The impending DDoS storm > > > On Wed, 2003-08-13 at 10:55, Ingevaldson, Dan (ISS Atlanta) wrote: > >-Does one DNS lookup on "windowsupdate.com" and then uses the IP > > No, I wouldn't dream of setting windowsupdate.com to 127.0.0.1. Who in > their right mind would do that? > > -Jack > --

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RE: How much longer..
by McBurnett, Jim 13 Aug '03

13 Aug '03

OK.. I have lurked enough on this one.. $60 Billion plus for microsoft.. and 600 millions lines of code. thousands of employee programmers... $1 million for *NIX less than a million lines of code. rewritten on a whim, and source given to millions.. Bugs will be found and squashed easier. Less code, more eyes. and less complex. Less market, less users, less interest for hackers 5 less than statements for *NIX and how many more statements for Micro$oft? This is like trying to comparing the towing capacity of car to turbo diesal pickup. there is no comparison... I don't care if MicroSoft spends $600 Million a year, there will always be bugs. If a software package was perfect or a network was perfect how many of us would have jobs? Nothing in this world is perfect, and complaining about it does absolutely no good.... J -----Original Message----- From: Charles Sprickman [mailto:spork@inch.com] Sent: Wednesday, August 13, 2003 4:30 PM To: Crist Clark Cc: nanog(a)merit.edu Subject: Re: How much longer.. On Wed, 13 Aug 2003, Crist Clark wrote: > Attacks _are_ on Linux machines. There have been Linux worms, Lion attacked > BIND, Ramen attacked rpc.statd and wu-ftpd, Slapper attached Apache, to > name a few. Attacks are on Solaris, the sadmin/IIS worm (which also attacked > IIS, a cross-platform worm, remember that, cool, huh?). Attacks are on FreeBSD, > Scalper worm attacked Apache. > > How soon people seem to forget these things. No, I don't think people are forgetting, but what Len was originally pointing out is that Microsoft, *because* of their vast install base *needs* to take a more proactive role in producing a secure OS. And the reason you can call it a "toy" OS is that on one hand you have *BSD, Linux and friends all with an annual budget of what, maybe $1M? And on the other hand you have a multi-billion dollar *software* company. Which should churn out better software? :) Charles > To pound it home one more time, worms that attack Microsoft products are a > bigger deal only because Microsoft has at least an order of magnitude greater > installbase than the nearest competitor. > -- > Crist J. Clark crist.clark(a)globalstar.com > Globalstar Communications (408) 933-4387 > > The information contained in this e-mail message is confidential, > intended only for the use of the individual or entity named above. > If the reader of this e-mail is not the intended recipient, or the > employee or agent responsible to deliver it to the intended recipient, > you are hereby notified that any review, dissemination, distribution or > copying of this communication is strictly prohibited. If you have > received this e-mail in error, please contact postmaster(a)globalstar.com >

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Genuity/Verizon Online filtering port 135?
by Stephen Milton 13 Aug '03

13 Aug '03

I have some customers using Verizon Online DSL in Washington state, and they are seeing TCP/135 port filtering on their connection. Calls to tech support stated that they were not blocking, but that is tech support. Anyone have a contact at Genuity/Verizon Online network operations? TIA. -- Stephen Milton - Founder/VP Internet (425) 881-8769 x102 ISOMEDIA.COM - Premium Internet Services (425) 869-9437 Fax milton(a)isomedia.com http://www.isomedia.com

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Re: Port blocking last resort in fight against virus
by Steven M. Bellovin 13 Aug '03

13 Aug '03

In message <Pine.GSO.4.53.0308131452310.19594(a)rampart.argfrp.us.uu.net>, "Chris topher L. Morrow" writes: >This is the point, atleast I, have been trying to make for 2 years... end >systems, or as close to that as possible, need to police themselves, the >granularity and filtering capabilities (content filtering even) are >available at that level alone. > It's just not possible. Believe it or not, I don't much like firewalls. But see slide 5 of a talk I gave in May, 1994 (http://www.research.att.com/~smb/talks/firewalls.ps or http://www.research.att.com/~smb/talks/firewalls.pdf) for why we need them. We'll *always* have buggy code. Yes, Microsoft has shipped buggy code. So has everyone else. For fun, I tallied up the source of the responsible vendor for every CERT advisory issued last year or this. There have been 57 of them. 17 were miscellaneous -- other vendors, incidents (like the current worm), etc. 9 were about Sun. 13 were about Microsoft. And 18 were about open source software -- a couple of Apache bugs, some ssh issues, etc. Looking beyond CERT advisories, I recently tallied up how many times someone could have penetrated my machines, and I run them about as tightly as possible. Given problems in ssh, various PDF readers, gv, etc., I tallied about a dozen times I could have been had. Now, that tally is the tip of the iceberg. Microsoft itself had 72 bulletins last year and 31 this year -- there's no doubt that they've shipped awful code (and worse yet, they have an awful architecture from a security perspective). But they're not the only villain, and the open source software implicated runs on most of the open source Unix systems (Linux in its many incarnations, *BSD, etc) and even on some of the proprietary ones. **The purpose a firewall is to keep the hackers away from the buggy code.** Should ISPs filter? Sometimes there's no choice. Note that there are two distinct forms of "network security" problems. The classic type -- the kind firewalls were designed to deal with -- aren't really network security problems. They're host security problems where the network is the conduit. I suspect that ISPs should not filter most such traffic, except with the consent of (and often payment from) the site. (I'll also note that there are designs for doing such filtering on the end systems, though it's easier to block traffic there than to selectively permit it.) The other kind of problem is one that affects the infrastructure. DDoS is the classic example, but worms are another instances where some filtering is often necessary -- not to protect the end users, but to protect the network for everyone else. On this list, I don't have to repeat the full litany problems that worms can cause -- I'm sure many of you remember the clogged ARP caches from Code Red-triggered scans of cable modem routers, or the near-collapse of many networks from Slammer. We're living in an exceedingly imperfect software world. Firewalls and the like are just one form of defense -- but I'll take any defense I can get. --Steve Bellovin, http://www.research.att.com/~smb

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How much longer..
by Len Rose 13 Aug '03

13 Aug '03

How much longer will people put up with the millions of dollars of losses in time, resources and service inflicted on the net by the joke vulnerabilities in the toy operating system known as Windows? Enough is Enough. Sure, let's just filter everything..all service providers please become M$'s virtual firewall now please. Haven't you windows lamers learned anything yet? Len

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Re: How much longer ..
by John Neiberger 13 Aug '03

13 Aug '03

>http://www.theregister.co.uk/content/55/30072.html > >"The Klez virus last year cost businesses $9 billion worldwide in lost >productivity," When I read stuff like this I always wonder if these businesses count the time spent patching their systems as 'lost' productivity. John --

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Fw: Detecting worm infection by remote
by james 13 Aug '03

13 Aug '03

Well the lame moderator at intrusions(a)incidents.org will not let this message pass. Anyone have any ideas ? Sorry as this is off topic, too bad a security list has problems with questions like this ! I would like start having support call infected users, once the storm passes. james : ----- Original Message ----- : From: "james" <jamesh(a)cybermesa.com> : To: <intrusions(a)incidents.org> : Sent: Wednesday, August 13, 2003 2:46 PM : Subject: Detecting worm infection by remote : : : : I am trying to build a list of infected users, is it possible to just nmap : : tcp port 4444 ? Does anyone know of a scanner I could use ? We had : : to lock ports 135-139 down all over the state to bring this under control : : as the users were scanning local users & causing slowdowns. So I cannot detect infections via : : port 135-139 tcpdumps or Snort. : : : : James Edwards : : Routing and Security Administrator : : jamesh(a)cybermesa.com : : At the Santa Fe Office: Internet at Cyber Mesa : : Store hours: 9-6 Monday through Friday : : : :

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Port blocking last resort in fight against virus
by Sean Donelan 13 Aug '03

13 Aug '03

This is the first trade publication I've seen that's covered some of the issues with ISPs blocking or not blocking ports. Port blocking last resort in fight against virus Long term problems can be caused by port blocking by Paul Brislen and James Niccolai, Auckland and San Francisco http://computerworld.co.nz/webhome.nsf/UNID/BEC6DE12EC6AE16ECC256D8000192BF… "While some end users are calling for ISPs to block certain ports relating to the Microsoft exploit as reported yesterday (Feared RPC worm starts to spread), most ISPs are reluctant to do so."

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RE: A new version on the loose...
by Scott Weeks 13 Aug '03

13 Aug '03

Let's see. They shout "the sky is falling, the sky is falling!!!" ...the world community might face a global Internet slow-down and regional disruption of access to the World Wide Web... and on the same page they say "antivirus: buy and download Kaspersky software online!" I dunno, lemme go back to lurking and attempt to connect the dots... 8-) scott : * From: Jack McCarthy : * Date: Wed Aug 13 16:09:42 2003 : : If you haven't already heard...... : : http://www.kaspersky.com/news.html?id=985370

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ftp.gnu.org compromised
by Len Rose 13 Aug '03

13 Aug '03

http://ftp.gnu.org/MISSING-FILES.README

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