Symantec Enterprise AV Open To Multiple Attacks

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September 02, 2005 (3:27 PM EDT)

By Gregg Keizer , TechWeb Technology News

Security researchers on Wednesday posted information about the second report this week of bugs in Symantec's enterprise anti-virus software.

The most recent vulnerability, details of which were posted on the Bugtraq security mailing list, is the second to hit Symantec AntiVirus 9 Corporate Edition this week.

This newest flaw could allow a local attacker or unauthorized user to view server log-in usernames and passwords in clear text posted to a log file generated by AntiVirus 9 as it connects to and downloads updates from Symantec's LiveUpdate system.

The log contains information such as the server name, IP address, subnet, subnet mask, connection protocol, username, and password to access the LiveUpdate server, the bug report went on. "A local attacker can subsequently access the file and disclose authentication credentials to access the server. This may lead to various attacks including the potential compromise of the server."

As of Friday, there was no remedy available from Symantec, but a representative from the Cupertino, Calif.-based company's product security team wrote on Bugtraq that they were aware of the vulnerability and were investigating it.

On Monday, Reston, Va.-based security intelligence firm VeriSign iDefense announced that an old vulnerability in AntiVirus Corporate Edition had just resurfaced. "This vulnerability is a re-appearance of an old bug formerly found in the Symantec 7.x series virus scan product," said the company in its alert as it linked to bug reports from back in 2002.

The vulnerability in the anti-virus software's HTML help system could let an attacker gain access to all files on the affected system, said iDefense. Symantec confirmed the problem, and in an online notice said that a third maintenance release (MR) for the product fixed the bug.

"Symantec strongly recommends users update to the latest MR available for Symantec AntiVirus Corporate Edition 9.0 and Symantec Client Security 2.0," the company urged.