RE: Remote Desktop/Term. Serv information leakage

Salvador.Manaois_at_infineon.com
Date: 07/04/05

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    Date: Mon, 4 Jul 2005 14:32:08 +0800
    To: <thor@hammerofgod.com>, <kuffya@gmail.com>, <pen-test@securityfocus.com>
    
    

    How about creating a VPN tunnel to the "isolated" network and connecting
    via RDP through this tunnel (an overkill? =))? How about totally dissing
    the remote connection capabilities to the "isolated" network?

    ...badz... http://rancidroot.blogspot.com

    -----Original Message-----
    From: Thor (Hammer of God) [mailto:thor@hammerofgod.com]
    Sent: Saturday, July 02, 2005 9:23 AM
    To: kuffya@gmail.com; pen-test@securityfocus.com
    Subject: Re: Remote Desktop/Term. Serv information leakage

    I've followed this thread a bit, and I think you (and possibly some
    others)
    might be looking at this the wrong way... Remote Desktop accepts remote
    client share offerings, so the whole ascii/text rdpclip point is moot.
    From
    the server, you just hit \\tsclient\drive and copy whatever you want to
    (if
    the client has shared the resource.)

    This has nothing to do with Remote Desktop being "possible to configure
    securely." It's more of what permissions you give the user you have
    allowed
    to log into the server in the first place. To be pedantic, since you
    say
    "Remote Desktop" rather than "Terminal Services" that assumes a Win2k3
    machine that you have admin access to. *That's* the security issue. In

    Win2k, you had 2 modes to TS-- "Remote Admin" and "Application Mode."
    "Remote Admin" was admin user only, "Application Mode" giving concurrent

    access to whatever userbase you allowed. In Win2k3, Remote Desktop is
    installed by default (though not *enabled*) giving an admin access to
    the
    box equivalent to "TS Remote Admin" mode in Win2k without the need to
    install the "Terminal Services" bits (but still Admin)

    What is the difference between the user pasting ascii text into notepad
    from
    the client or just being able to run notepad in the remote session and
    typing in whatever he wants? Or writing it in whatever compiler exists
    on
    the server, or running DEBUG from cmd and entering and saving his own
    .com
    file for that matter? Or whatever else the server allows you to do
    (Like
    just browse the network and grab files off of a regular share from the
    remote session?)

    The real question here is not how to stop an admin from doing things on
    a
    box that an admin can do, but rather, what the purpose of this
    "isolated"
    network is, what resources are available to the "isolated" network, and
    why
    they call it an "isolated" network in the first place if you can log in
    via
    Remote Desktop from a client that is not on the "isolated" network.

    What exactly are you trying to mitigate? A the actions of a malicious
    admin?

    t

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    ----- Original Message -----
    From: <kuffya@gmail.com>
    To: <pen-test@securityfocus.com>
    Sent: Friday, July 01, 2005 7:41 AM
    Subject: Remote Desktop/Term. Serv information leakage

    > Hi list,
    > One of our recent clients has a seperate 'isolated' network where they
    > keep sensitive material. This network is not connected to the
    internet, is
    > not physically accessible and you can only connect to it using remote
    > desktop. They asked us to test if the isolated network was adequately
    > protected.
    > Here's what I discovered: When you start a Rem Desktop session from
    the
    > main network to the isolated one you can actually copy and paste stuff

    > across...this is only true for text not for complete files, and seems
    to
    > be by design. What is more worrisome is that you can even copy across
    > executables doing simple tricks such as
    > 1)download an executable
    > 2)change extension to .txt
    > 3) copy (the text version) across to a notepad.
    > 4)change it back to .exe
    > So literally we have a significant leakage over here, introducing
    threats
    > to the isolated network.
    > I am posting this to ask your opinion on how this could be
    > mitigated......I think that Remote Desktop is not possible to
    configure
    > securely since it's not designed as such...and hence it transfers
    across
    > anything it receives , be it mouse movements or copied & pasted
    text...
    > So I was trying to think what would be the best solution, without
    spending
    > a fortune on a 'secure' commercial solution, that is. Maybe something
    like
    > SSH tunneling then Rem. Desktop or VNC or what?
    > And do you think this 'bug' is something investigating any further? Is
    it
    > something you people knew of?
    >
    > Thanks a lot.
    >
    >


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