[NEWS] Mac OS X Insecure pty Permissions

SecuriTeam <[email protected]>
Newsgroups gmane.comp.security.securiteam
Message-ID <[email protected]>
The following security advisory is sent to the securiteam mailing list, and can be found at the SecuriTeam web site: http://www.securiteam.com
- - promotion

The SecuriTeam alerts list - Free, Accurate, Independent.

Get your security news from a reliable source.
http://www.securiteam.com/mailinglist.html 

- - - - - - - - -



  Mac OS X Insecure pty Permissions
------------------------------------------------------------------------


SUMMARY

pty is "a parallel terminal device in Unix that allow users to communicate 
with the operating system in command line".

Mac OS X doesn't provide any mechanism for non-setuid-root programs to 
change permissions on ptys allowing any local user to sniff the tty 
connection.

DETAILS

Vulnerable Systems:
 * Mac OS X 10.3 family and  prior

Immune Systems:
 * Mac OS X 10.4

Due to lack of ability to change permissions of pty, xterms, screen 
sessions, and Terminal.app windows (with explicitly specified commands) 
are vulnerable to tty sniffing. Using Terminal.app's standard terminal 
with /usr/bin/login is safe since login is setuid root.

Example:
arctic:~> screen
.. new screen session starts ...
arctic:~> ls -l $TTY
crw-rw-rw-  1 root  wheel    4,   2  1 May 16:44 /dev/ttyp2

The fixed problem in Mac OS X now sets the devfs permissions on openpty().


ADDITIONAL INFORMATION

The information has been provided by  <mailto:[email protected]> Matt 
Johnston .



======================================== 


This bulletin is sent to members of the SecuriTeam mailing list. 
To unsubscribe from the list, send mail with an empty subject line and body to: [email protected] 
In order to subscribe to the mailing list, simply forward this email to: [email protected] 


==================== 
==================== 

DISCLAIMER: 
The information in this bulletin is provided "AS IS" without warranty of any kind. 
In no event shall we be liable for any damages whatsoever including direct, indirect, incidental, consequential, loss of business profits or special damages.
lmpx.com only provides a reader for public news (NNTP) servers. It is not affiliated with the servers or forums shown here and is not responsible for the content of articles, which is written by their respective authors.