From: mattmurphy at kc.rr.com (Matthew Murphy)
Subject: Re: Clarification on Xitami DoS

>This thread is a good demonstration for why vendors need to be
>responsive to incoming vulnerability reports.  

Very true.

It should also be noted that this morning I did receive a response
from iMatix.

>Without a response from
>the vendor, we've now got a number of posts in which people have spent
>extra time to (a) try to figure out the underlying cause of the issue,
>(b) try to duplicate the issue, and (c) try to come up with a
>resolution in the absence of vendor guidance and/or a patch.  Vendors
>often know the answers to these questions.

No kidding?  Good find. :-)

>Greater overall responsiveness by vendors is covered heavily by
>section 3 of the Responsible Vulnerability Disclosure Process draft
>[1].  Better responsiveness from vendors (and better coordination
>overall) can reduce much of this guesswork, so that sysadmins and
>security researchers can spend their time on more pressing issues.

How convenient.  When you are talking about vendors, you harp
on the part that says vendors must be responsible, but you don't
bring up the part that says in order to be ethical I have to leave
people vulnerable for thirty days or more without a peep...

Really, there is no responsible disclosure that can be a one size
fits all policy like an RFC.  Experiences even with the same vendor
vary by incident, so you really cannot possibly produce one list
of expectations for so many potentially vulnerable vendors...

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