[comp.sys.apollo] Security Problem

gupta@prlhp1.prl.philips.co.uk (Ashok Gupta) (03/12/90)

There is a potentially serious security problem on Apollo's.

If one quits from `mail' and logs off immediately then the 
shell running mail does not get closed. I say it is only 
potentially serious because one has to log off as soon
as quitting from mail for the problem to occur - and therefore
the rapid sequence of events must be of low probability.

If one was running mail from the C-shell, its pad gets closed.
However, if running mail from the Bourne and Aegis shells, their 
pads stay open.

Pads to all shells - other than the one running mail - are closed.
The system is in login mode and the login prompt is displayed.

/bin/ps -aux does not show the running  shell.
/com/pst does - and indicates it's active.
/com/lusr -allp -n on my node, says no one's logged in but
  shows the running shell process.
Hitting the <Edit> and <Read> keys causes the message
 `Command is not allowed during login' to be displayed.

The running shell has my privileges.   I can cat, print,
sed, delete files.

To close the shell I have to <CNTRL> Z and <CNTRL> N.

This was first observed on an Apollo 3000 running SR9.7
where the problem is reproducible.

It was not reproducible on a 3500 running SR10.2.

-- 
Ashok "Ash" Gupta
Post : Philips Research Labs, Crossoak Lane, Redhill, Surrey, RH1 5HA, U.K.
Voice: +44 293 785544 ext 5647
JANET: gupta@prl.philips.co.uk  ARPA: gupta%prl.philips.co.uk@nsfnet-relay.ac.uk

baggins@batserver.cs.uq.oz.au (William Segall) (03/15/90)

gupta@prlhp1.prl.philips.co.uk (Ashok Gupta) writes:


>It was not reproducible on a 3500 running SR10.2.
Happened to me on a 3500 running SR10.2 this afternoon. In this case the
process was an xterm invoked from my .xinitrc by

/usr/bin/X11/xterm -geometry 80x40-200+15 -title $XHOST -e rsh $XHOST&

XHOST was a sun on our network. I haven't managed to reproduce this but I
had turned the wmgr off and on.

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Bill Segall			email: baggins@batserver.cs.uq.oz.au
				Ph: (07) 377 2956

The thing that astonished him was that cats should have two holes cut in
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