New exploit targets corporate CA users

An exploit specifically targeting corporate Computer Associates users has been created some three weeks after a critical vulnerability was identified.

The attack uses an ActiveX Control buffer overflow vulnerability present in 21 CA products, including BrightStor ARCServe Backup for Laptops and Desktops, Unicentre Remote Control, Software Delivery, Asset Management, Desktop Management Bundle and Desktop Management Suite.

The exploit was rated as critical by the French Security Incident Response Team (FSIRT), which discovered the vulnerability, and allows hackers to launch local and remote attacks such as a denial of service (DoS) or a hijack of the affected system.

Thompson Cyber Security Labs director, and consultant to AVG, Rodger Thompson, who discovered the hack, said attacks will become widespread because of the popularity of the exploit's NeoSploit toolkit delivery system.

"The vulnerability is likely to be quite widespread, simply because of CA's size and spread within the corporate market," Thompson said in his blog.

"Corporate clients should probably be pretty nervous, because their firewall is unlikely to protect them against this."

FSIRT claimed the buffer overflow error occurs in the ListCtrl.ocx ActiveX Control when handling overly long arguments passed to the "AddColumn()" method. This can be exploited by remote attackers to execute arbitrary code by tricking users into visiting a malicious Web page.

The Neosploit toolkit is an advanced exploit framework which is used as Common Gateway Interface (CGI) script to deliver randomized executables through malicious Web sites. Exploit code is obfuscated using custom JavaScript and the function name and local variables are randomized to avoid detection by Intrusion Detection Systems (IDSs).

AVG marketing manager Lloyd Borrett said the exploit will become widespread because corporate IT has a reluctance to push out patches.

"The big problem is the corporate world has a lot of people in standard operating environments, and there is a culture for IT to take a long time to roll out updates," Borrett said.

CA was unavailable for comment at the time of publication.

Computerworld Australia is an InfoWorld affiliate.