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=============================================================================
CERT(sm) Advisory CA-96.20
Original issue date: September 18, 1996
Last revised: November 21, 1996
              Added a pointer to CA-96.24 for more sendmail information.

              A complete revision history is at the end of this file.

Topic: Sendmail Vulnerabilities
- -----------------------------------------------------------------------------
           ** See also CA-96.24.sendmail.daemon.mode for information 
              about additional vulnerabilities in sendmail. **

The CERT Coordination Center has received reports of two security problems in
sendmail that affect all versions up to and including 8.7.5. By exploiting
the first of these vulnerabilities, users who have local accounts can gain
access to the default user, which is often daemon. By exploiting the second
vulnerability, any local user can gain root access.

The CERT/CC team recommends installing vendor patches or upgrading to the
current version of sendmail (8.7.6). Until you can do so, we urge you to
apply the workaround provided in Sec. III.C. In all cases, be sure to take
the extra precautions listed in Sec. III.D.

For beta testers of sendmail 8.8: The vulnerabilities described in this
advisory have been fixed in the beta version.

We will update this advisory as we receive additional information. Please
check advisory files regularly for updates that relate to your site. In
addition, you can check ftp://info.cert.org/pub/latest_sw_versions/sendmail
to identify the most current version of sendmail.

- -----------------------------------------------------------------------------

I.   Description

     There are two vulnerabilities in all versions of sendmail up to and
     including sendmail 8.7.5. The first vulnerability is a resource starvation
     problem and the second is a buffer overflow problem.

     Resource Starvation
     -------------------

     When email is forwarded to a program using a .forward file or an :include:
     statement within a .forward or alias file, that program is executed as the
     owner of the .forward file or the file referenced by the :include:
     statement. Similarly, if email is forwarded to a file, that file is
     opened as the owner of the .forward file or the file referenced by the
     :include: statement. The file owner is called the "controlling user."

     If the message cannot be delivered immediately, the name of the
     controlling user is written into the queue file along with the other
     delivery information so that the appropriate permissions can be acquired
     when the mail queue is processed.

     Only the name of the controlling user is written in the queue file. This
     name is derived by calling the system routine getpwuid(3) on the user id
     of the file owner. If getpwuid fails, the sendmail default user (defined
     by the DefaultUser option in 8.7 and by the "u" and "g" options in older
     releases) is assumed.

     In some cases, the system can be forced into resource starvation, thus
     forcing getpwuid(3) to fail even though an entry exists in /etc/passwd
     corresponding to that uid. Since getpwuid has no way of portably
     returning an error meaning "resource failure" as distinct from "user id
     not found," sendmail has no way of distinguishing between these cases; it
     assumes that the uid is unknown and falls back to the default user.

     By starving sendmail of specific resources, sendmail will create files
     owned by the default user. Once created, these files can be used to
     access other files owned by the default user. In addition, these files
     owned by the default user can be used to leverage access to other
     privileged users on the system.

     Buffer Overflows
     ----------------
     There are several buffer overflows present in sendmail version 8.7.5 and
     earlier. Some of the buffer overflows could result in local users gaining
     unauthorized root access.

     Significant work has been done on sendmail version 8.8 (now in beta
     test) to eliminate the problem, and the code changes originally planned
     for 8.8 have been backported to 8.7.6 to address these vulnerabilities.

II.  Impact

     Resource Starvation
     -------------------
     Anyone with access to an account on the system can run programs or write
     files as the default user. The danger of compromising the default user
     depends primarily on the other files in your system owned by that user.

     For example, on many systems the line printer spool directory (e.g.,
     /var/spool/lpd) is owned by daemon; because the line printer subsystem
     runs setuid root, it may be possible to gain additional privileges.
     However, some other systems have no files owned by user daemon on the
     default system, and the only files owned by group daemon are not
     writable by that group; hence, the danger is minimal.

     Buffer Overflows
     ----------------
     Anyone with access to an account on the system can gain root access.

III. Solution

     Install a patch from your vendor if one is available (Sec. A) or upgrade
     to the current version of sendmail (Sec. B). Until you can take one of
     those actions, we recommend applying the workaround described in Sec. C.
     This workaround addresses the resource starvation problem but not buffer
     overflows.

     In all cases, you should take the precautions listed in Sec. D.

     Note to beta testers of sendmail 8.8: The vulnerabilities described in
     this advisory have been fixed in the beta version of 8.8.

     A. Install a vendor patch.

        Below is a list of the vendors who have provided information about
        sendmail. Details are in Appendix A of this advisory; we will update
        the appendix as we receive more information. If your vendor's name
        is not on this list, please contact the vendor directly.

            Digital Equipment Corporation
            FreeBSD
            Hewlett-Packard Company
            IBM Corporation
            Linux
            Open Software Foundation
            The Santa Cruz Operation
            Silicon Graphics Inc.
            Sun Microsystems, Inc.

     B. Upgrade to the current version of sendmail.

        Install sendmail 8.7.6. This version is a "drop in" replacement for
        8.7.x. There is no patch for 8.6.x. If you are using version 8.6 or
        earlier, you need to upgrade to the current version and rebuild your
        sendmail.cf files. Upgrading to version 8.7.6 addresses both
        vulnerabilities described in this advisory.

        Sendmail 8.7.6 is available from

ftp://ftp.sendmail.org/ucb/src/sendmail/sendmail.8.7.6.tar.gz
ftp://info.cert.org/pub/tools/sendmail/sendmail.8.7.6.tar.gz
ftp://ftp.cert.dfn.de/pub/tools/net/sendmail/sendmail.8.7.6.tar.gz
ftp://ftp.auscert.org.au/pub/mirrors/ftp.cs.berkeley.edu/ucb/sendmail/*

        MD5 (sendmail.8.7.6.tar.gz) = 4a1f2179c53c9106bc8d7738f4d55667

        Also in that directory are .Z and .sig files. The .Z file contains the
        same bits as the .gz file, but is compressed using UNIX compress
        instead of gzip. The .sig is Eric Allman's PGP signature for the
        uncompressed tar file. The key fingerprint is

  Type bits/keyID    Date       User ID
  pub  1024/BF7BA421 1995/02/23 Eric P. Allman <eric@CS.Berkeley.EDU>
            Key fingerprint =  C0 28 E6 7B 13 5B 29 02  6F 7E 43 3A 48 4F 45 29
                                Eric P. Allman <eric@Reference.COM>
                                Eric P. Allman <eric@Usenix.ORG>
                                Eric P. Allman <eric@Sendmail.ORG>
                                Eric P. Allman <eric@CS.Berkeley.EDU>

        We strongly recommend that when you change to a new version of sendmail
        you also change to the configuration files that are provided with that
        version.

        Significant work has been done to make this task easier. It is now
        possible to build a sendmail configuration file (sendmail.cf) using the
        configuration files provided with the sendmail release. Consult the
        cf/README file for a more complete explanation. Creating your
        configuration files using this method makes it easier to incorporate
        future changes to sendmail into your configuration files.

        For sites that use the ampersand character ('&') in the gecos
        field of /etc/passwd, they should be aware that this may cause the
        full name returned to be corrupted or empty. (See man (4) passwd
        for further details on the purpose of the ampersand character in the
        gecos field.) Therefore when configuring sendmail, sites may also
        wish to ensure that information in the gecos field is explicitly
        complete, rather than rely on name expansion using the ampersand
        character.

        Finally, for Sun users, a paper is available to help you convert your
        sendmail configuration files from the Sun version of sendmail to one
        that works with sendmail version 8.7.x. The paper is entitled
        "Converting Standard Sun Config Files to Sendmail Version 8" and was
        written by Rick McCarty of Texas Instruments Inc. It is included in
        the distribution and is located in contrib/converting.sun.configs.

     C. Apply a workaround.

        Resource Starvation
        -------------------
        Eric Allman, the author of sendmail, has provided the following
        workaround to the resource starvation vulnerability.

        Using smrsh as "prog" mailer limits the programs that can be run as
        the default user. Smrsh does not limit the files that can be written,
        but less damage can be done by writing files directly.

        The damage can be almost entirely constrained by ensuring that the
        default user is an innocuous one. Sendmail defaults to 1:1 (daemon)
        only because that is reasonably portable. A special "mailnull"
        account that is used only for this purpose would be better. This user
        should own no files and should have neither a real home directory nor
        a real shell. A sample password entry might be:

           mailnull:*:32765:32765:Sendmail Default User:/no/such/dir:/dev/null

        A corresponding entry should be made in /etc/group:

           mailnull:*:32765:

        These assume that there are no other users or groups with id = 32765
        on your system; if there are, pick some other unique value.

        NOTE: When allocating a numeric uid to the "mailnull" user you should
             be careful to ensure that this value is less than the value of
             the UID_MAX kernel variable, if your system implements this
             variable. To check whether your system implements this
             variable (and the value that it uses), check for a reference
             to it in the "limits.h" header file, which should be located
             in the directory /usr/include, or one of its subdirectories.
             For further information on the use and content on the "limits.h"
             header file, see the man (4) limits.

        After creating this user, change the line in /etc/sendmail.cf reading

           O DefaultUser=1:1

         to read

           O DefaultUser=mailnull

        If you are running 8.6.*, you will have to change the lines reading

           Ou1
           Og1

        to read

           Ou32765
           Og32765

       Finally, if you are using the m4(1)-based sendmail configuration scheme
       provided with sendmail 8.7.*, you should add the following line to the
       m4 input file, usually named sendmail.mc:

           define(`confDEF_USER_ID', 32765:32765)

       The actual values should, of course, match those in the passwd file.

       Buffer Overflows
       ----------------
       There is no workaround for the buffer overflow problem. To address this
       problem, you must apply your vendor's patches or upgrade to the current
       version of sendmail (version 8.7.6).

D. Take additional precautions.

   Regardless of which solution you apply, you should take these extra
   precautions to protect your systems.

   * Use the sendmail restricted shell program (smrsh)

     With *all* versions of sendmail, use the sendmail restricted shell
     program (smrsh). You should do this whether you use vendor-supplied
     sendmail or install sendmail yourself. Using smrsh gives you improved
     administrative control over the programs sendmail executes on behalf of
     users.

     A number of sites have reported some confusion about the need to continue
     using the sendmail restricted shell program (smrsh) when they install a
     vendor patch or upgrade to a new version of sendmail. You should always
     use the smrsh program.

     smrsh is included in the sendmail distribution in the subdirectory
     smrsh. See the RELEASE_NOTES file for a description of how to integrate
     smrsh into your sendmail configuration file.

     smrsh is also distributed with some operating systems.

   * Use mail.local

     If you run /bin/mail based on BSD 4.3 UNIX, replace /bin/mail with
     mail.local, which is included in the sendmail distribution. It is also
     included with some other operating systems distributions, such as
     FreeBSD.

     Although the current version of mail.local is not a perfect solution, it
     is important to use it because it addresses vulnerabilities that are
     being exploited. For more details, see CERT advisory CA-95:02.

     Note that as of Solaris 2.5 and beyond, mail.local is included with the
     standard distribution. To use mail.local, replace all references to
     /bin/mail with /usr/lib/mail.local. If you are using the M4(1)-based
     configuration scheme provided with sendmail 8.X, add the following to
     your configuration file:

        define(`LOCAL_MAILER_PATH', /usr/lib/mail.local)

   * WARNING: Check for executable copies of old versions of mail programs

     If you leave executable copies of older versions of sendmail installed
     in /usr/lib (on some systems, it may be installed elsewhere), the
     vulnerabilities in those versions could be exploited if an intruder
     gains access to your system. This applies to sendmail.mx as well as
     other sendmail programs. Either delete these versions or change the
     protections on them to be non-executable.

     Similarly, if you replace /bin/mail with mail.local, remember to remove
     old copies of /bin/mail or make them non-executable.

...........................................................................

Appendix A - Vendor Information

Below is a list of the vendors who have provided information for this
advisory. We will update this appendix as we receive additional information.
If you do not see your vendor's name, please contact the vendor directly.

Berkeley Software Design, Inc.
==============================
   BSDI has released a patch for BSD/OS V2.1 to update
   sendmail to the 8.7.6 version. The patch is available
   from the patches@BSDI.COM mailback server or via ftp at:
        ftp://ftp.BSDI.COM/bsdi/patches/patches-2.1/U210-024


Digital Equipment Corporation
=============================
[About the resource starvation problem]
  Source:
      Software Security Response Team
      Copyright (c) Digital Equipment Corporation 1996. All rights reserved.
      08.SEP.1996

   At the time of writing this document, patches (binary kits) for Digital's
   UNIX related operating systems are being developed. Digital will provide
   notice of availability for remedial kits through AES services (DIA, DSNlink
   FLASH), placed in the public FTP patch service domain and also be
   available from your normal Digital Support channel.

          ftp://ftp.service.digital.com/public/{OS}/{vn.n}
                                                |     |
                                                |     |--version
                                                |--osf or ultrix

    9/96                                   - DIGITAL EQUIPMENT CORPORATION


FreeBSD
=======
   All currently released FreeBSD distributions have this vulnerability, as
   we distribute sendmail 8.7.x as part of our operating system.  However,
   our -current and -stable source distributions were updated on 18 Sep 1996
   to sendmail 8.7.6.  Users tracking -current or -stable are advised to
   upgrade and recompile sendmail at their earliest convinience.

   An official FreeBSD security advisory, including patches to close this
   vulnerability in FreeBSD 2.1.5 will be available shortly.  The security
   advisory will appear at

      ftp://freebsd.org/pub/CERT/patches/SA-96:18/

   when available.


Hewlett-Packard Company
=======================
[About the both the resource starvation and the buffer overflow problem]

   HP-UX is vulnerable, and patches are in progress.

   The HP SupportLine Mail Service provides notification of security patches
   for HP-UX to its 'security_info' mailing list. For information on the
   service, send mail to support@us.external.hp.com with 'help' in the body of
   the message (without quotes).

   To report new security defects in HP software, send mail to
   security-alert@hp.com.


IBM Corporation
================
  The following APARs are being developed and will be available shortly.
  See the appropriate release below to determine your action.


  AIX 3.2
  -------
    Apply the following fixes to your system:

       APAR - IX61303 IX61307


  AIX 4.1
  -------
    Apply the following fixes to your system:

        APAR - IX61162 IX61306

    To determine if you have this APAR on your system, run the following
    command:

       instfix -ik IX61162 IX61306


  AIX 4.2
  -------
    Apply the following fixes to your system:

        APAR - IX61304 IX61305

    To determine if you have this APAR on your system, run the following
    command:

       instfix -ik IX61304 IX61305



  To Order
  --------
    APARs may be ordered using Electronic Fix Distribution (via FixDist)
    or from the IBM Support Center.  For more information on FixDist,

       http://service.software.ibm.com/aixsupport/

    or send e-mail to aixserv@austin.ibm.com with a subject of "FixDist".


  IBM and AIX are registered trademarks of International Business Machines
  Corporation.


Linux
=====
[For the resource starvation problem:]

   Debian Linux: not vulnerable (uses smail)

   Red Hat and derivatives:
        ftp://ftp.redhat.com/pub/redhat-3.0.3/i386/updates/RPMS/sendmail*


Open Software Foundation
========================
   OSF's OSF/1 R1.3.2 is not vulnerable to these types of attacks described in
   the resource starvation sections of the advisory.

   OSF's OSF/1 R1.3.2 is vulnerable to the buffer overflow problems.
   We will address the problem in our next maintenance release.


The Santa Cruz Operation
========================

   Any SCO operating system running a version of sendmail provided by SCO
   is vulnerable to this problem. SCO is providing Support Level
   Supplement (SLS) oss443a for the following releases to address this issue:
   SCO Internet FastStart release 1.0.0
   SCO OpenServer releases 5.0.0 and 5.0.2

   This SLS provides a pre-release version of sendmail release 8.7.6
   for these platforms. SCO hopes to have a final version of sendmail 8.7.6
   available to address both issues mentioned in this advisory in the near
   future.

   Note that only SCO Internet FastStart uses sendmail as the default mail
   system. All other SCO operating systems use other mail systems such as the
   Multi-Channel Memorandum Distribution Facility (MMDF) or the "mailsurr"
   mail system as the default, and as such are not vulnerable to this
   problem unless otherwise configured to use sendmail.

   SCO intends to provide a similar patch for SCO UnixWare release 2.1.0
   in the near future.

   When configured to use a version of sendmail provided by SCO, releases
   prior to the ones mentioned here are also vulnerable, but no
   plans have yet been made concerning patches for these earlier releases.

   You can download SLS oss443a as shown below.

   Anonymous ftp   (World Wide Web URL)
   -------------

        ftp://ftp.sco.COM/SSE/oss443a           (SLS image)
        ftp://ftp.sco.COM/SSE/oss443a.ltr.sse   (cover letter/install notes)

   Compuserve
   ----------

   SLS oss443a is also available in the SCO Forum on Compuserve.

   SCO Online Support (SOS) BBS
   ----------------------------

   SLS oss443a can also be downloaded interactively via X, Y, or Z MODEM or
   Kermit, using the SCO Online Support System (SOS). Follow the menu
   selections under "Toolchest" from the main SOS menu.

   The phone numbers available for interactive transfer from SOS are:

   1-408-426-9495                  (USA)
   +44 (0)1923 210 888             (United Kingdom)

   Checksums
   ---------

   sum -r
   ------

   13804   630 oss443a
   35304    14 oss443a.ltr.sse

   MD5
   ---

   MD5 (oss443a) = 549260a71ca76f4e98dd38bccb72748c
   MD5 (oss443a.ltr.sse) = 7475d83f0db64a1af69eb66cd392a9d3

   Be sure to keep track of the README file at ftp://ftp.sco.COM/SSE/README
   for updates to this supplement.

   If you have further questions, contact your support provider. If you
   need to contact SCO, please send electronic mail to support@sco.COM, or
   contact SCO as follows.

        USA/Canada: 6am-5pm Pacific Daylight Time (PDT)
        -----------
        1-800-347-4381  (voice)
        1-408-427-5443  (fax)

        Pacific Rim, Asia, and Latin American customers: 6am-5pm Pacific
        ------------------------------------------------ Daylight Time
                                                         (PDT)
        1-408-425-4726  (voice)
        1-408-427-5443  (fax)

        Europe, Middle East, Africa: 9am-5:30pm Greenwich Mean Time (GMT)
        ----------------------------
        +44 (0)1923 816344 (voice)
        +44 (0)1923 817781 (fax)


Silicon Graphics, Inc.
======================
   We are analyzing the vulnerability, and will provide additional
   information as it becomes available.


Sun Microsystems, Inc.
======================
   Sun is working on a patch which will fix both problems, and we expect to
   have it out by the end of the month. Also, we will send out a Sun bulletin
   on this subject at about the same time.

- -----------------------------------------------------------------------------
The CERT Coordination Center staff thanks Eric Allman, the author of sendmail,
for his extensive assistance with this advisory, Wolfgang Ley of DFN-CERT and
members of the AUSCERT for their contributions, and D. J. Bernstein of the
University of Illinois at Chicago for reporting the resource starvation
vulnerability.
- -----------------------------------------------------------------------------

If you believe that your system has been compromised, contact the CERT
Coordination Center or your representative in the Forum of Incident Response
and Security Teams (see ftp://info.cert.org/pub/FIRST/first-contacts).


CERT/CC Contact Information
- ----------------------------
Email    cert@cert.org

Phone    +1 412-268-7090 (24-hour hotline)
                CERT personnel answer 8:30-5:00 p.m. EST(GMT-5) / EDT(GMT-4)
                and are on call for emergencies during other hours.

Fax      +1 412-268-6989

Postal address
         CERT Coordination Center
         Software Engineering Institute
         Carnegie Mellon University
         Pittsburgh PA 15213-3890
         USA

Using encryption
   We strongly urge you to encrypt sensitive information sent by email. We can
   support a shared DES key or PGP. Contact the CERT/CC for more information.
   You can get the CERT PGP key from ftp://info.cert.org/pub/CERT_PGP.key
   Location of CERT PGP key
         ftp://info.cert.org/pub/CERT_PGP.key

Getting security information
   CERT publications and other security information are available from
        http://www.cert.org/
        ftp://info.cert.org/pub/

   CERT advisories and bulletins are also posted on the USENET newsgroup
        comp.security.announce

   To be added to our mailing list for advisories and bulletins, send your
   email address to
        cert-advisory-request@cert.org

- ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Copyright 1996 Carnegie Mellon University
This material may be reproduced and distributed without permission provided
it is used for noncommercial purposes and the copyright statement is
included.

CERT is a service mark of Carnegie Mellon University.
- ---------------------------------------------------------------------------

This file:
      ftp://info.cert.org/pub/cert_advisories/CA-96.20.sendmail_vul
      http://www.cert.org
               click on "CERT Advisories"


~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Revision history

Nov. 21, 1996  Introduction - Added a pointer to CA-96.24 for information
                 on more sendmail vulnerabilities.
Nov. 19, 1996  Appendix A - Updated Hewlett-Packard information to address
                  both problems.
Sep. 21, 1996  Sec. III.B - added instructions on configuring sendmail at
                 sites that use '&' in the gecos filed of /etc/passwd.
               Sec. III.C - added a note on uid for "mailnull" user.

Sep. 19, 1996  Sec. III.B - added URL in Australia for sendmail
               Acknowledgements - included reference that had been omitted
                 earlier.
               Appendix, FreeBSD - added an entry.
Sep. 18, 1996  Appendix, BSDI - added an entry containing patch information.



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