Microsoft added a new security feature to their latest C++ compiler, called both Visual C++.Net and Visual C++ version 7 that was released February 13th. This security feature is meant to protect potentially vulnerable source code automatically from some forms of buffer overflow attack. The protection afforded by the new feature allows developers to continue to use vulnerable string functions such as strcpy() as usual and still be "protected" against some forms of stack smashing. The new feature is closely based on an invention of Crispin Cowan's called StackGuard and is meant to be used when creating standard native code (not the new .NET intermediate language, referred to as "managed code"). Note that the new feature is meant to protect any program compiled with the "protected" compiler feature. In other words, the idea is that using this feature should help developers build more secure software. However, in its current form, the Microsoft feature leads to a false sense of security because it is easily defeated. Microsoft's feature includes the ability to set a "security error handler" function to be called when a potential attack is underway. Because of the way this was implemented, the Microsoft security feature is itself vulnerable to attack. An attacker can craft a special-purpose attack against a "protected" program, defeating the protection mechanism in a straightforward way. This kind of attack is not new. See, for example, Phrack 56 at http://www.phrack.org/show.php?p=56&a=5 There are several well known approaches not based on StackGuard that a compiler-producer might use to defeat buffer overflow attacks. Microsoft chose to adopt a weak solution rather than a more robust solution. This is a design-level flaw leading to a very serious set of potential attacks against code compiled with the new compiler. The Microsoft compiler is thus in some sense a "vulnerability seeder". More technical information about the flaw can be found at http://www.cigital.com/news/mscompiler-tech.html Microsoft has been alerted to the flaw. Chris Ren
