Fundamental Netscape hack

Of course, one of the most serious security problems with Netscape servers
is that they run on machines sitting out there on the Internet where
anybody who can browse their services can attack them - that 128-bit
bullet-proof iron-clad front door isn't much help if the garage door is
unlocked because of some sendmail bug.  For most web applications,
the big security need is to send a chunk of encrypted data to some server
that will decrypt it and get you credit-card number or whatever,
but the standard SSL and S/HTTP protocols want to decrypt the data
to plaintext on the Web server before it can do anything like that.

(OK, I guess this doesn't win me a T-Shirt, since enough other people
have said similar things, but do I at least get a gif of the shirt
and a crayon so I can roll my own?  :-)  Good work, folks!
#---
# Bill Stewart, Freelance Information Architect, stewarts@ix.netcom.com
# Phone +1-510-247-0664 Pager/Voicemail 1-408-787-1281
#---

> (OK, I guess this doesn't win me a T-Shirt, since enough other people
> have said similar things, but do I at least get a gif of the shirt
> and a crayon so I can roll my own?  :-)  Good work, folks!

	GIFs of the shirt will be available on the web page as soon as
they are designed. (Times like these make me wish I owned a mac.)

-- 
sameer						Voice:   510-601-9777
Community ConneXion				FAX:	 510-601-9734
An Internet Privacy Provider			Dialin:  510-658-6376
http://www.c2.org (or login as "guest")			sameer@c2.org

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On Tue, 19 Sep 1995, Bill Stewart wrote:

> Of course, one of the most serious security problems with Netscape servers
> is that they run on machines sitting out there on the Internet where
> anybody who can browse their services can attack them - that 128-bit
> bullet-proof iron-clad front door isn't much help if the garage door is
> unlocked because of some sendmail bug.  

Or- even easier yet- improper httpd installation or users who have not
been properly trained.  NCSA's default configuration file makes document
root a subtree.  One major institution I deal with regularly (and the
administrators should know better) changed the default setting, allowing
users to store html files in their home directory.  And, it seems, the
file permissions were too lax.  If a user had no index.html then I could
just cruise through their home directory, view most files and, in some
(inappropriate) cases, download them.  I told the administrator, and
mailed him a copy of a user's address book (she was a friend and knew what
I was doing before I did it).  The situation has changed and is now more
secure.  But I wonder how many other institutions have an inappropriate 
DocumentRoot so (I guess) users can have a "single home directory"?

===========================================================================
     Henry W. Farkas      |      Me?    Speak for IBM?    Fat chance.
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