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- DDN MGT Bulletin 64 DCA DDN Defense Communications System
- 08 Aug 89 Published by: DDN Network Info Center
- (NIC@NIC.DDN.MIL) (800) 235-3155
-
- DEFENSE DATA NETWORK
- MANAGEMENT BULLETIN
-
- The DDN MANAGEMENT BULLETIN is distributed online by the DDN Network
- Information Center under DCA contract as a means of communicating
- official policy, procedures and other information of concern to
- management personnel at DDN facilities. Back issues may be read
- through the TACNEWS server ("@n" command at the TAC) or may be
- obtained by FTP (or Kermit) from the SRI-NIC host [26.0.0.73 or
- 10.0.0.51] using login="anonymous" and password="guest". The pathname
- for bulletins is DDN-NEWS:DDN-MGT-BULLETIN-nn.TXT (where "nn" is the
- bulletin number).
-
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-
- SECURITY PROBLEM IN SUN3 AND SUN4 UNIX - RESTORE
-
- APPLICABLE OPERATING SYSTEM: UNIX 4.0, 4.01, 4.03 running on Sun3 and
- Sun4 machines.
-
- PROBLEM: A serious security problem has been discovered in SunOS
- restore. The problem occurs because restore is setuid to
- root. Without going into details, is sufficient to say
- that this is a serious hole. All SunOS 4.0 installations
- should install one of the two workarounds described below.
-
- The first is preferred as it makes restore unexecutable by
- ordinary users, but this workaround makes it impossible to
- restore via a remote tape drive. If you need to restore in
- this way, the second workaround will limit the use of restore
- to a select group.
-
- WORKAROUND(1): Make restore non-setuid by becoming root and doing a
-
- chmod 750 /usr/etc/restore
-
- This makes restore non-setuid and unreadable and
- unexecutable by ordinary users.
-
- Making restore non-setuid affects the restore command
- using a remote tape drive. You will no longer be able to
- run a restore from another machine as an ordinary user;
- instead, you'll have be root to do so. (The reason for
- this is that the remote tape drive daemon on the machine
- with the tape drive expects a request on a TCP privileged
- port. Under SunOS, you can't get a privileged port unless
- you are root. By making restore non-setuid, when you run
- restore and request a remote tape drive, restore won't be
- able to get a privileged port, so the remote tape drive
- daemon won't talk to it.)
-
-
- WORKAROUND(2): If you do need to have some users run restore from
- remote tape drives without being root, you can use the
- following workaround.
-
- cd /usr/etc
- chgrp operator restore
- chmod 4550 restore
-
- This allows the use of restore by some trusted group.
- In this case, we used the group 'operator', but you may
- substitute any other group that you trust with access
- to the tape drive. Thus, restore is still setuid and
- vulnerable, but only to the people in the trusted group.
-
- The 4550 makes restore readable and executable by the group
- you specified, and unreadable by everyone else.
-
-
- CONTACTS: Call your Sun customer support representative if you have
- any questions. Refer to this problem by Sun's bug number
- 1019265. If you have difficulty reaching your
- representative, call the Sun Hotline at
-
- (800) USA-4SUN or (800) 872-4786
-
- Call CERT at (412) 268-7090 for general problem information.
- Call SRI/NIC at 1-800-235-3155 for general information.
-
-
- NOTE(1): This bulletin represents the best information available
- at this time on this problem. As with any system
- modification, WORK WITH YOUR SUN REPRESENTATIVE.
-
- NOTE(2): Only those sites that run SunOS 4.0, 4.0.1, and 4.0.3 are
- affected. It does not appear in SunOS 3.5.
-
- NOTE(3): A user does need to have an existing account to exploit
- this hole; however, `GUEST' is sufficient.
-
-
-