bugtraq - Re: Linux OpenExchange - cleartext rootpw in swap

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Message-ID: <26305.84.128.64.126.1093978130.squirrel@84.128.64.126>
Date: Tue, 31 Aug 2004 20:48:50 +0200 (CEST)
From: "Rainer Duffner" <rainer@...ra-secure.de>
To: "Rene" <l0om@...luded.org>
Cc: bugtraq@...urityfocus.com
Subject: Re: Linux OpenExchange - cleartext rootpw in swap

On Di, 31.08.2004, 10:11, Rene sagte:
>
>
> date: 31.08.2004
> author: l0om   -  l0om [at] excluded dot org - www.excluded.org
> discovered in: SuSE Linux Openexchange Server 4
> problem: cleartext rootpw in swap caused by fergotten "mlock" or wiping
> out memory
>
>
> hi,
>
> i have noticed my root password flying around on my swap in cleartext.
> an attacker who has successfully rooted a box can get the cleartext
> password from the swap device.
>
> i dont know if this is caused by some SuSE mistake at the web login- maybe
> its a fault in openldap.
> i dont know exactly where this is caused.
>

Well, if the server is "rooted", as you like to put it, there's little
point in gaining the root-password anyway, isn't it ?
You can do pretty much everything, except login as the administrator-user
via the web-interface. Being able to scratch the root-pw out of swap is
just a bonus, if you ask me.

It would be bad, if a non-priviledged user had access to the swap-partition.
On the two SLOXs I have access to, the swap-partition is only
group-readable by the "disk" group.
Or is there some other way of reading the swap-partition ?

If not, this is not a big concern to me (and we run and support some of
these for various customers).

If, OTOH, you had talked about the empty password for the SLOX'
postgres-database.... that would be something completely different (TM).

cheers,
Rainer