__________________________________________________________ The U.S. Department of Energy Computer Incident Advisory Center ___ __ __ _ ___ / | /_\ / \___ __|__ / \ \___ __________________________________________________________ INFORMATION BULLETIN Oracle File Overwrite Security Vulnerability [Oracle Security Alert #20] October 29, 2001 21:00 GMT Number M-012 ______________________________________________________________________________ PROBLEM: The oracle binary executable has a vulnerability with the SETUID bit, allowing unauthorized write privileges of trace files in ORACLE_HOME/rdms/log and other directories. PLATFORM: All Oracle database server releases (8.0.x, 8.1.x, and 9.0.1) on all Unix platforms. DAMAGE: This vulnerability allows unauthorized, non-privileged users (e.g., "nobody") to overwrite/corrupt existing files and create new files in arbitrary directories of choice. SOLUTION: Apply the workaround described below (change file permissions on the oracle executables). ______________________________________________________________________________ VULNERABILITY The risk is MEDIUM. This vulnerability can be exploited by a ASSESSMENT: non-privileged user, resulting in an upgrade of privileges. ______________________________________________________________________________ LINKS: CIAC BULLETIN: http://www.ciac.org/ciac/bulletins/m-012.shtml ORIGINAL BULLETIN: http://otn.oracle.com/deploy/security/pdf/oracle_race.pdf ______________________________________________________________________________ [***** Start Oracle Security Alert #20 *****] Security Alert #20 Reference Date: 10/18/01 Oracle File Overwrite Security Vulnerability Overview There is a potential security vulnerability associated with the Oracle binary oracle on UNIX platforms. A non-privileged user (such as "nobody") invokes the oracle executable: as a result of the presence of the SETUID bit, the executable can be forced to write to a trace file in ORACLE_HOME/rdbms/log directory and thereby overwrite existing log files or create new (unauthorized) files. The non-privileged user can also point the environment variable, ORACLE_HOME, to an arbitrary directory in the operating system and thereby corrupt other files as well. Products All Oracle database server releases (8.0.x, 8.1.x and 9.0.1) Platforms All Unix platforms Workaround Change the file permissions on the oracle executable as follows: % chmod o-x oracle Notes The workaround suggested above will permit only the owner of the oracle executable and users defined in the OS DBA group to run the oracle executable directly. With the execute permissions for "others" removed, other users cannot connect to an Oracle database server using the BEQ driver. If the BEQ driver is being used to connect to an Oracle database, a client program (such as SQLPLUS) will fork its processes and try to execute the oracle executable directly. This operation will fail because such a client program will run with the OS user’s privileges who no longer has execute permission on the oracle executable. To avoid this problem, local users must connect to an Oracle database using the IPC driver which makes it possible to connect to a TNS listener listening on an Oracle database. The TNS listener will need to be started by a user that has execute permissions on the oracle executable. Patches The potential security vulnerability will be code-fixed in the next release of the Oracle database server which is Oracle9i, Release 2, only. All other releases of the Oracle database (8.0.x, 8.1.x and 9.0.1) must use follow the workarounds specified above to circumvent the potential security vulnerability. Credits Oracle wishes to thank Juan Manuel Pascual Escribà for discovering these vulnerabilities and promptly bringing them to Oracle's attention. [***** End Oracle Security Alert #20 *****] _______________________________________________________________________________ CIAC wishes to acknowledge the contributions of Oracle for the information contained in this bulletin. _______________________________________________________________________________ CIAC, the Computer Incident Advisory Center, is the computer security incident response team for the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) and the emergency backup response team for the National Institutes of Health (NIH). CIAC is located at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in Livermore, California. CIAC is also a founding member of FIRST, the Forum of Incident Response and Security Teams, a global organization established to foster cooperation and coordination among computer security teams worldwide. CIAC services are available to DOE, DOE contractors, and the NIH. CIAC can be contacted at: Voice: +1 925-422-8193 (7x24) FAX: +1 925-423-8002 STU-III: +1 925-423-2604 E-mail: ciac@ciac.org Previous CIAC notices, anti-virus software, and other information are available from the CIAC Computer Security Archive. World Wide Web: http://www.ciac.org/ Anonymous FTP: ftp.ciac.org PLEASE NOTE: Many users outside of the DOE, ESnet, and NIH computing communities receive CIAC bulletins. If you are not part of these communities, please contact your agency's response team to report incidents. Your agency's team will coordinate with CIAC. The Forum of Incident Response and Security Teams (FIRST) is a world-wide organization. A list of FIRST member organizations and their constituencies can be obtained via WWW at http://www.first.org/. This document was prepared as an account of work sponsored by an agency of the United States Government. Neither the United States Government nor the University of California nor any of their employees, makes any warranty, express or implied, or assumes any legal liability or responsibility for the accuracy, completeness, or usefulness of any information, apparatus, product, or process disclosed, or represents that its use would not infringe privately owned rights. Reference herein to any specific commercial products, process, or service by trade name, trademark, manufacturer, or otherwise, does not necessarily constitute or imply its endorsement, recommendation or favoring by the United States Government or the University of California. The views and opinions of authors expressed herein do not necessarily state or reflect those of the United States Government or the University of California, and shall not be used for advertising or product endorsement purposes. LAST 10 CIAC BULLETINS ISSUED (Previous bulletins available from CIAC) M-002: Multi-Vendor format String Vulnerability in ToolTalk Service M-003: Hewlett-Packard rpcbind Security Vulnerability M-004: Excel and PowerPoint Macro Vulnerability M-005: Office XP Error Reporting May Send Sensitive Documents to Microsoft M-006: HP-UX telnetd Security Vulnerability M-007: Macintosh OS-X Application Manager Vulnerability M-008: Sun rpc.yppasswdd Security Vulnerability M-009: Red Hat Linux PAM Vulnerability M-010: Red Hat OpenSSH Vulnerability M-011: Oracle Trace Collection Security Vulnerability