The Property section of the website suffered a serious SQL injection vulnerability which was disclosed by the group. The affected section of the website is currently offline:

Figure 1: Telegraph.co.uk's Properties section was taken offline after the compromise

It is interesting to point out that despite the fact that SQL injection is the most well understood web application attack, yet many high profile websites are still vulnerable. The Property section of the telegraph.co.uk website utilized scripts that did not sanitize variable inputs properly leading to the execution of custom SQL queries by manipulating the input SQL query. The result? Well, the below pictures released by the group reveal all:

Figure 2: Database listing

It is very interesting to learn that the website developers did not think about hashing the subscriber passwords and instead chose to store them in plain text:

Figure 3: User passwords dumped in plain text

Figure 4: Email addresses galore

There are a lot of lessons to be learned from this disclosure. For the end-user: do not use a common password.

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This release dwarfs Microsoft’s one-patch fix that affects Windows 2000, Windows XP, Windows Server 2003, Windows Vista and Windows Server 2008.

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Read more about the details here.

The discovery, however, does not post a serious security risk as the technique has not been disclosed. Furthermore, most CAs are already using at least SHA-1 for the hashing function instead of MD5. The slow mover, VeriSign, acknowledged the attack today and confirms that all certificates issued are not vulnerable to the new attack.

If you are still paranoid, get hold of an Extended Validation Certificate.

Happy New Year 2009!

Update (January 2 – 10:30PM +4GMT) – A Firefox plugin has been released that warns users about certificate chains that utilize MD5 hash algorithm for the RSA signature.

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Things could change for Microsoft with the introduction of “Morro” – a free solution that Microsoft describes as “comprehensive protection from malware including viruses, spyware, rootkits and trojans…will be architected for a smaller footprint that will use fewer computing resources, making it ideal for low-bandwidth scenarios or less powerful PCs”. “Morro” would be available in the second half of 2009; Windows Live OneCare subscription service will be discontinued effective June 30, 2009.

According to Microsoft’s official press release:

“Customers around the world have told us that they need comprehensive, ongoing protection from new and existing threats, and we take that concern seriously,” said Amy Barzdukas, senior director of product management for the Online Services and Windows Division at Microsoft. “This new, no-cost offering will give us the ability to protect an even greater number of consumers, especially in markets where the growth of new PC purchases is outpaced only by the growth of malware.”

It would be interesting to see how Symantec and McAfee respond to this move by Microsoft.

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This comes as welcome news by the cyber security community as EstDomains.com has been used by cyber criminals for years to hide their identities and conduct various malicious activities such as using domains for bot command & control servers, drive-by downloads as well as spamming.

Here are some links of interest that provide more information on this story:

1. F-Secure Weblog - “Case EstDomains” 
2. The Washington Post Company – “ICANN De-Accredits EstDomains for CEO’s Fraud Convictions”
3. Notice sent to EstDomains.com by ICANN (pdf)

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The team was made aware of this particular Cross-Site Scripting issue yesterday morning (Sunday, Oct. 26) and a fix was deployed within a matter of hours. Yahoo! appreciates Netcraft’s assistance in identifying this issue.

As a safety precaution, we recommend users change their passwords, should they still be concerned. Users should always verify via their Sign-in Seal that they are giving their passwords to Yahoo.com.

The session authentication cookies could have been used for accessing Yahoo! services such as Yahoo! Mail and Yahoo! HotJobs amongst others.

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According to an army document produced in August this year for the Pentagon’s Department for Acquisition, Technology and Logistics and first reported last week by Inside Defense:

“Exfiltrations of unclassified data from [military contractor computer] systems have occurred and continue to occur, potentially undermining and even neutralizing the technological advantage and combat effectiveness of the future force,”

“Current … efforts largely focus on mitigating risks of compromise to war-fighting technologies as a result of traditional espionage or industrial theft,”

“hostile actors can exfiltrate large volumes of unclassified program information in a single attack that can potentially net enough information to enable adversaries to narrow a capability gap.”

Sure this initiative will bear fruit but I think more needs to be done within the Government security departments to combat potential cyber security threats. Only this week I saw Airport Security personnel hooked up on MSN.com at the Chicago O’Hare International Airport on a light day. Open Internet is a risky area for airport security personnel don’t you think?

More on the story here

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One can only wonder whether the information on the hard drive was encrypted or not…

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According to the report:

LIGNex1 develops and manufactures Hyunmoo surface-to-surface missile, Haeseong ship-to-ship missile and Shingung portable ground-to-air weapons. Hyundai Heavy Industries manufactures Haeseong, the nation’s first Aegis ship, plus destroyers and submarines for the Navy. Although the development costs of such high-tech weapons are kept secret, the construction of the King Sejong the Great-class destroyer is said to cost over W1 trillion (US$1=W1,165) and development of Haeseong ship-to-ship missile W100 billion with each missile at approximately W2 billion.

The National Security Research Institute, which is affiliated with the Electronics and Telecommunications Research Institute, believes hackers have planted vicious codes through which they stolen information. “The research institute suspects the culprits are Chinese or North Korean hackers but doesn’t know specifically what information they stole,” Kim said. “In the worst case, the blueprints of missiles and Aegis ship could have been stolen.”

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The shut down plan follows arrest of one of its administrators, Cha0 (Cagatay Evyapan), by Turkish police earlier this month.

The whole story is covered in great detail this story on Wired’s Blog, Threat Level.  So, what’ next after DarkMarket.ws?

DarkMarket emerged after ShadowCrew.com was taken offline and I reckon it is not going to take long before another online community fills the void left by DarkMarket’s departure from the scene.

There are already a handful of other established online forums that cater to the needs of cyber criminals and new ones crop up all the time offering some high-value loot for those in need:

Fig. 1- A post on a DarkMarket wanna-be forum

Fig. 2: Same post, more details

Some of the more established forums would welcome the extra traffic that they generate from the less experienced DarkMarket users, looking for other market places to trade in:

Fig. 3: "Real-looking" credit cards packed with actual victim data are now being sold online.

Fig. 4: They sure do look "real"

Indepent trading sites are likely to see a surge in their business too as some of the cyber criminals are likely to deal direct without exposing any of their information on any online forums:

Fig. 5: One of the more "reputable" stolen credit card sales website.

Although none of the existing online hacker market places can truly replace the stature of DarkMarket, there is likely to be a surge in competition amongst the various online underground sites to try and reach the level of popularity that DarkMarket currently enjoys.

Any new community formed by the existing DarkMarket admins is likely to see stricter membership controls which probably served as the weak link for the forum; DarkMarket user-level access accounts were being retailed at competing forums privately for US$800 and above, just a couple of weeks ago.

It would be interesting to see what comes next after DarkMarket – and how the law enforcement agencies play catch-up with the notorious underground hacker market places.

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