IRIX disk_bandwidth Vulnerability

BID:214

Info

IRIX disk_bandwidth Vulnerability

Bugtraq ID: 214
Class: Environment Error
CVE:
Remote: Yes
Local: Yes
Published: Jul 20 1998 12:00AM
Updated: Jul 20 1998 12:00AM
Credit: An advisory was posted by SGI Security Coordinator <[email protected]> on July 20, 1998 to the Bugtraq mailing list.
Vulnerable: SGI IRIX 6.4
Not Vulnerable:

Discussion

IRIX disk_bandwidth Vulnerability

A vulnerability exists in the disk_bandwidth program, shipped with IRIX 6.4 S2MP for the Origin/Onyx2, from Silicon Graphics. This vulnerability will allow any local user to execute commands as root.

While the exact nature of this vulnerability is not known, it is believed to be similar to the IRIX ioconfig vulnerability, published at the same time. By altering the PATH environment variable, and creating an executable (be it compiled program or a shell script) of the correct name, the disk_bandwidth program will execute it with full root privilege.

Exploit / POC

IRIX disk_bandwidth Vulnerability

Currently the SecurityFocus staff are not aware of any exploits for this issue. If you feel we are in error or are aware of more recent information, please mail us at: [email protected].

Solution / Fix

IRIX disk_bandwidth Vulnerability

Solution:
SGI recommends changing the permissions of the disk_bandwidth program to allow execution only by system administrators. Removing the setuid bit, and restricting the file permissions to allow only for execution by root, or those in a specific group will eliminate this vulnerability, so long as these users do not have '.' as the first element in their path; this would allow an attacker to possibly still perform the attack, by waiting for the administrator to execute the program in a specific directory.

# chmod 500 /sbin/disk_bandwidth

References

IRIX disk_bandwidth Vulnerability

References:

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