Security Bulletin 9201 DISA Defense Communications System

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Security Bulletin 9201 DISA Defense Communications System
January 22,1992 Published by: DDN Security Coordination Center
([email protected]) 1-(800) 365-3642

DEFENSE DATA NETWORK
SECURITY BULLETIN

The DDN SECURITY BULLETIN is distributed by the DDN SCC (Security
Coordination Center) under DISA contract as a means of communicating
information on network and host security exposures, fixes, & concerns
to security & management personnel at DDN facilities. Back issues may
be obtained via FTP (or Kermit) from NIC.DDN.MIL [192.112.36.5]
using login="anonymous" and password="guest". The bulletin pathname is
SCC:DDN-SECURITY-yynn (where "yy" is the year the bulletin is issued
and "nn" is a bulletin number, e.g. SCC:DDN-SECURITY-9201).
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! !
! The following important advisory was issued by the Computer !
! Emergency Response Team (CERT) and is being relayed unedited !
! via the Defense Information Systems Agency's Security !
! Coordination Center distribution system as a means of !
! providing DDN subscribers with useful security information. !
! !
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CA-92:01 CERT Advisory
January 20, 1992
NeXTstep Configuration Vulnerability

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The Computer Emergency Response Team/Coordination Center (CERT/CC)
has received information concerning a vulnerability in release 2 of
NeXTstep's NetInfo default configuration. This vulnerability will
be corrected in future versions of NeXTstep.

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I. Description

By default, a NetInfo server process will provide information to
any machine that requests it.

II. Impact

Remote users can gain unauthorized access to the network's
administrative information such as the passwd file.

III. Solution

Ensure that the trusted_networks property of each NetInfo domain's
root NetInfo directory is set correctly, so that only those systems
which should be obtaining information from NetInfo are granted
access. The value for the trusted_networks property should be the
network numbers of the networks the server should trust.

Note that improperly setting trusted_networks can render your
network unusable.

Consult Chapter 16, "Security", of the "NeXT Network and System
Administration" manual for release 2 for details on setting the
trusted_networks property of the root NetInfo directory.

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The CERT/CC wishes to thank NeXT Computer, Inc. for their cooperation in
documenting and publicizing this security vulnerability.
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If you believe that your system has been compromised, contact CERT/CC via
telephone or e-mail.

Internet E-mail: [email protected]
Telephone: 412-268-7090 (24-hour hotline)
CERT/CC personnel answer 7:30a.m.-6:00p.m. EST(GMT-5)/EDT(GMT-4),
on call for emergencies during other hours.

Computer Emergency Response Team/Coordination Center (CERT/CC)
Software Engineering Institute
Carnegie Mellon University
Pittsburgh, PA 15213-3890

Past advisories and other information related to computer security are
available for anonymous ftp from the cert.sei.cmu.edu (192.88.209.5) system.

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