Sunday, May 18, 2008

Redmondmag...I told you so!

There is no more egregious an act of negligence committed by online vendors and businesses than ignoring notifications of vulnerabilities found in their applications.
So when Dancho Danchev pointed out that Redmond Magazine had been SQL injected by Chinese Hacktivists, I was both appalled, yet not surprised.
On January 29th, 2008 I informed 1105 Media, the parent company of the Redmond Media Group, of multiple XSS vulnerabilities in various properties they maintain, including EntMag.com and AdtMag.com, as well as Redmondmag.com.

From my email:
"I’d like to advise you of XSS vulnerabilities in the search code used by all Redmond Media Group websites.
This is most easily validated by pasting a simple script alert generator in the search form.
These vulnerabilities were disclosed by XSSed.com in February and July of 2007.
http://www.xssed.com/mirror/20073/
http://www.xssed.com/mirror/13305/
These vulnerabilities could be exploited by malicious people to conduct XSS attacks and it could further lead to reputation and PR issues for the Redmond Media Group."


Not only did they flatly ignore me, and they guys from XSSed.com who'd notified then in FEBRUARY and JULY 2007!, but all these vulnerabilities still exist, including Redmondmag.com. You could definitely say that these issues have led to "reputation and PR issues for the Redmond Media Group."
Doh! I told you so!
It goes without saying that if you are vulnerable to XSS, you have a significantly higher likelihood of being vulnerable to SQLi.
Redmondmag.com was also victimized by the 2nd wave of mass SQL injection attacks that dropped in nihaorr1.com/1.js.

Regarding current vulnerabilities, observe the following:
http://www.whiteacid.org/misc/xss_post_forwarder.php?xss_target=http://search.redmondmag.com/search.asp&cmd=search&SearchForm=%%SearchForm%%&index=C:\dtSearch\rmg\red_all&sort=Date&srcrequest=%22%3E%3CSCRIPT%3Ealert('XSS_Alert')%3C/SCRIPT%3E&submit1=Search">http://www.whiteacid.org/misc/xss_post_forwarder.php?xss_target=
http://search.redmondmag.com/search.asp&cmd=search&SearchForm=%%SearchForm%%&
index=C:\dtSearch\rmg\red_all&sort=Date&
srcrequest=(Insert JavaScript here)&submit1=Search


Props, as always, to Whiteacid's XSS Assistant and POST forwarder.
But behold, what do we see, but index=C:\dtSearch\rmg\red_all.
Well, now we know you use dtSearch on the C: of your Windows server (no surprise there ;-)).

Come on people, fix your sites!
You have been found guilty of the following charges:
1) Vulnerable to SQLi
2) Vulnerable to XSS
3) Internal file disclosure
4) Flagrant negligence with regard to secure coding best practices
50 Flagrant disregard fo information submitted to you by the information security community.
1105 Media and the Redmond Media Group, you have failed your readers, your visitors, your customers, and yourselves, and you should be ashamed.

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2 comments:

Rafal Los said...

You know Russ... the sad thing is they probably STILL don't care. It's just sad, sad, sad... maybe if they lost seriously copious amounts of ca$h as a result of their negligence, they would see the light. Companies always magically do... see the light... after a major disruption in cash flow.

Unknown said...

Russ, we do care.
I wish that I had gotten wind of the pending SQL attack and I would have tried to put up all preventitive measures.
I can't speak for the company as a whole but we here are Redmond Media were not aware of your email. Your help is mega valuable and I would appreciate any insight that you could give RMG. Trust me, it will be looked at and reviewed. If we had more individuals like yourself, Redmond Media would be a far superior community and resource.

JD Holzgrefe
Associate Publisher
Redmond Media Group
jdholzgrefe@1105media.com

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