Brief Hands-On Report--Apple released Mac OS X 10.4.9 Client and Server

Mac OS X 10.4.9 is out in client and server editions for Intel-based (Build 8P2137) and PowerPC-based (Build 8P135) Macs. The appropriate version is available for download and installation via Software Update or as a stand-alone file (as a delta or combo updater) from this Apple Web page. We recommend using the combo updater if a stand-alone file is used because it contains all of required updates to Mac OS X 10.4, even if it does take a bit longer to download.

Mac OS X 10.4.9 is a huge release and probably the last for Tiger. It has a long list of "...general operating system fixes, as well as specific fixes or compatibility updates for the following applications and technologies (Intel-based list):

- Application launch times
- RAW camera support
- Updated ATI and NVIDIA graphics drivers
- Handling of large or malformed images that could cause crashes
- Image capture performance
- Mouse scrolling and keyboard shortcuts
- Font handling
- Dashboard stability
- Playback quality, and bookmarks in DVD Player
- USB video conferencing cameras for use with iChat
- Bluetooth devices
- Browsing AFP servers
- Apple USB Modem
- Windows-created digital certificates
- Open and Print dialogs in applications that use Rosetta on Intel-based Macs
- Sharing using AFP, SMB/CIFS, NFS and FTP file sharing protocols
- Login and authentication in a variety of network environments
- Connecting to Cisco VPN servers using IP/Sec and NAT
- AirPort including connectivity to EAP-FAST networks
- Searching iWork ‘06 and Microsoft Office documents using Spotlight
- Viewing of QuickTime streaming media behind a firewall
- Audio playback in QuickTime, iTunes, Final Cut Pro, and Soundtrack applications
- Determining the space required to burn folders
- Synchronizing contacts, bookmarks, and calendars to .Mac and mobile phones
- Mounting and unmounting iDisk volumes
- Time zone and daylight saving for 2006 and 2007
- Security updates

The details of the security fixes, many identified by the Month of Apple Bugs Web site, are:

Viewing a maliciously-crafted image with an embedded ColorSync profile may lead to an unexpected application termination or arbitrary code execution--A stack buffer overflow exists in the handling of embedded ColorSync profiles. By enticing a user to open a maliciously-crafted image, an attacker can trigger the overflow, which may lead to an unexpected application termination or arbitrary code execution. This update addresses the issue by performing additional validation of ColorSync profiles. Credit to Tom Ferris of Security-Protocols for reporting this issue.

Viewing a malformed PDF Document may lead to an application hang--CoreGraphics has been updated to address the issue described on the Month of Apple Bugs web site (MOAB-06-01-2007), which may lead to an application hang.

Crash Reporter may allow a local admin user to obtain system privileges--Crash Reporter uses an admin-writable system directory to store logs of processes that have been unexpectedly terminated. A malicious process running as an admin can cause these logs to be written to arbitrary files as root, which could result in the execution of commands with elevated privileges. This issue has been described on the Month of Apple Bugs web site (MOAB-28-01-2007). This update addresses the issue by performing additional validation prior to writing to log files.

Remote attackers may cause a denial of service during SSL negotiation--A partially-negotiated SSL connection with the CUPS service may prevent other requests from being served until the connection is closed. This update addresses the issue by implementing timeouts during SSL negotiation.

Mounting a maliciously-crafted disk image may lead to an unexpected application termination or arbitrary code execution--A memory corruption vulnerability exists in diskimages-helper. By enticing a user to open a maliciously-crafted compressed disk image, an attacker could trigger this issue which may lead to an unexpected application termination or arbitrary code execution. This update addresses the issue by performing additional validation of disk images.

Mounting a maliciously-crafted AppleSingleEncoding disk image may lead to an unexpected application termination or arbitrary code execution--An integer overflow vulnerability exists in the handler for AppleSingleEncoding disk images. By enticing a local user to open a maliciously-crafted disk image, an attacker could trigger the overflow which may lead to an unexpected application termination or arbitrary code execution. This update addresses the issue by performing additional validation of AppleSingleEncoding disk images.

Downloading a maliciously-crafted disk image may lead to an unexpected system shutdown or arbitrary code execution--Several vulnerabilities exist in the processing of disk images that may lead to an unexpected termination of system operations or arbitrary code execution. These have been described on the Month of Kernel Bugs and Month of Apple Bugs web sites (MOKB-03-11-2006, MOKB-20-11-2006, MOKB-21-11-2006, MOAB-10-01-2007, MOAB-11-01-2007 and MOAB-12-01-2007). Since a disk image may be automatically mounted when visiting web sites, this allows a malicious web site to cause a denial of service. This update addresses the issue by performing additional validation of downloaded disk images prior to mounting them.

Unprivileged LDAP users may be able to change the local root password--An implementation flaw in DirectoryService allows an unprivileged LDAP user to change the local root password. The authentication mechanism in DirectoryService has been fixed to address this issue.

Playing maliciously-crafted Flash content could allow an HTTP request splitting attack--Adobe Flash Player is updated to version 9.0.28.0 to fix a potential vulnerability that could allow HTTP request splitting attacks. This issue is described as APSB06-18 on the Adobe web site at http://www.adobe.com/support/security/

Multiple vulnerabilities in GNU Tar, the most serious of which is arbitrary code execution--GNU Tar is updated from version 1.14 to 1.16.1. Further information is available via the GNU web site at http://www.gnu.org/software/tar/

Removing a file from a maliciously-crafted mounted filesystem may lead to a denial of service--An HFS+ filesystem in a mounted disk image can be constructed to trigger a kernel panic when attempting to remove a file from a mounted filesystem. This has been described on the Month of Apple Bugs web site (MOAB-13-11-2006). This update addresses the issue by performing additional validation of the HFS+ filesystem.

Console keyboard events are exposed to other users on the local system--Insufficient controls in the IOKit HID interface allow any logged in user to capture console keystrokes, including passwords and other sensitive information. This update addresses the issue by limiting HID device events to processes belonging to the current console user. Credit to Andrew Garber
of University of Victoria, Alex Harper, and Michael Evans for reporting this issue.

Viewing a maliciously-crafted GIF file may lead to an unexpected application termination or arbitrary code execution--An integer overflow vulnerability exists in the process of handling GIF files. By enticing a user to open a maliciously-crafted image, an attacker can trigger the overflow which may lead to an unexpected application termination or arbitrary code execution. This update addresses the issue by performing additional validation of GIF files. This issue does not affect systems prior to Mac OS X v10.4. Credit to Tom Ferris of Security-Protocols for reporting this issue.

Viewing a maliciously-crafted RAW Image may lead to an unexpected application termination or arbitrary code execution--A memory corruption issue exists in the process of handling RAW images. By enticing a user to open a maliciously-crafted image, an attacker can trigger the issue which may lead to an unexpected application termination or arbitrary code execution. This update addresses the issue by performing additional validation of RAW images. This issue does not affect systems prior to Mac OS X v10.4. Credit to Luke Church of the Computer Laboratory, University of Cambridge, for reporting this issue.

Malicious local users may be able to cause a denial of service--Using the fpathconf() system call on certain file types will result in a kernel panic. This has been described on the Month of Kernel Bugs web site (MOKB-09-11-2006). This update addresses the issue through improved handling for all kernel defined file types. Credit to Ilja van Sprundel for reporting this issue.

Executing a maliciously-crafted Universal Mach-O binary may lead to an unexpected termination of system operations or arbitrary code execution with elevated privileges--An integer overflow vulnerability exists in the loading of Universal Mach-O binaries. This could allow a malicious local user to cause a kernel panic or to obtain system privileges. This has been described on the Month of Kernel Bugs web site (MOKB-26-11-2006). This update addresses the issue by performing additional validation of Universal binaries.

Executing a maliciously-crafted program may lead to a system hang--The shared_region_make_private_np() system call allows a program to request a large allocation of kernel memory. This could allow a malicious local user to cause a system hang. This issue does not allow an integer overflow to occur, and it cannot lead to arbitrary code execution. This issue has been described on the Month of Kernel Bugs web site (MOKB-28-11-2006). This update addresses the issue by additional validation of the arguments passed to shared_region_make_private_np().

Multiple vulnerabilities in MySQL, the most serious of which is arbitrary code execution--MySQL is updated from version 4.1.13 to 4.1.22. Further information is available via the MySQL web site at http://dev.mysql.com/doc/refman/4.1/en/news-4-1-x.html

Malicious local users may be able to cause an unexpected termination of system operations or execute arbitrary code with elevated privileges--A memory corruption issue exists in the AppleTalk protocol handler. This could allow a malicious local user to cause a kernel panic or gain system privileges. This has been described on the Month of Kernel Bugs web site (MOKB-27-11-2006). This update addresses the issue by performing additional validation of the input data structures.

Maliciously-crafted AppleTalk requests may lead to a local denial of service or arbitrary code execution--A heap buffer overflow vulnerability exists in the AppleTalk protocol handler. By sending a maliciously-crafted request, a local user can trigger the overflow which may lead to a denial of service or arbitrary code execution. This has been described on the Month of Apple Bugs web site (MOAB-14-01-2007). This update addresses the issue by performing additional validation of the input data.

A remote attacker can destroy established trust between SSH hosts by causing SSH Keys to be regenerated--SSH keys are created on a server when the first SSH connection is established. An attacker connecting to the server before SSH has finished creating the keys could force the keys then to be recreated. This could result in a denial of service against processes that rely on a trust relationship with the server. Systems that already have SSH enabled and have rebooted at least once are not vulnerable to this issue. This issue is addressed by improving the SSH key generation process. This issue is specific to the Apple implementation of OpenSSH. Credit to Jeff McCune of The Ohio State University for reporting this issue.

Multiple vulnerabilities in OpenSSH, the most serious of which is arbitrary code execution--OpenSSH is updated to version 4.5. Further information is available via the OpenSSH web site at http:// www.openssh.org/txt/release-4.5.

An unprivileged local user can overwrite arbitrary files with system privileges--Insecure file operations may occur during the initialization of a USB printer. An attacker may leverage this issue to create or overwrite arbitrary files on the system. This update addresses the issue by improving the printer initialization process.

Opening a maliciously-crafted PICT image may lead to an unexpected application termination or arbitrary code execution--A heap buffer overflow vulnerability exists in QuickDraw's PICT image processing. By enticing a user to open a maliciously-crafted image, an attacker can trigger the overflow which may lead to an unexpected application termination or arbitrary code execution. This update addresses the issue by performing additional validation of PICT files. Credit to Tom Ferris of Security-Protocols and Mike Price of McAfee AVERT Labs for reporting this issue.

Opening a malformed PICT image may lead to an unexpected application termination--QuickDraw Manager has been updated to address the issue described on the Month of Apple Bugs web site (MOAB-23-01-2007), which may lead to an unexpected application termination. This issue does not lead to arbitrary code execution.

Remote attackers may be able to access Server Manager without valid credentials--An issue in Server Manager's validation of authentication credentials could allow a remote attacker to alter the system configuration. This update addresses the issue by additional validation of authentication credentials.

A user with write access to an SMB share may be able to cause a denial of service or arbitrary code execution--A stack buffer overflow vulnerability exists in an Apple-specific Samba module. A file with an overly-long ACL could trigger the overflow, which may lead to a denial of service or arbitrary code execution. This update addresses the issue by performing additional validation of ACLs. This issue does not affect systems prior to Mac OS X v10.4. Credit to Cameron Kay of Massey University, New Zealand for reporting this issue.

Opening a maliciously-crafted Software Update Catalog file may lead to an unexpected application termination or arbitrary code execution--A format string vulnerability exists in the Software Update application. By enticing a user to download and open a Software Update Catalog file, an attacker can trigger the vulnerability which may lead to an unexpected application termination or arbitrary code execution. This has been described on the Month of Apple Bugs web site (MOAB-24-01-2007). This update addresses the issue by removing document bindings for Software Update Catalogs. This issue does not affect systems prior to Mac OS X v10.4. Credit to Kevin Finisterre of DigitalMunition for reporting this issue.

A local user with sudo access to a bash script can run arbitrary commands with elevated privileges--A user-modified sudo configuration could allow environment variables to be passed through to the program running as a privileged user. If sudo is configured to allow an otherwise unprivileged user to execute a given bash script with elevated privileges, the user may be able to execute arbitrary code with elevated privileges. Systems with the default sudo configuration are not vulnerable to this issue. This issue has been addressed by updating sudo to 1.6.8p12. Further information is available via the sudo web site at http://www.sudo.ws/sudo/current.html

A remote attacker can conduct cross-site scripting attacks through Blojsom--A cross-site scripting vulnerability exists in Blojsom. This allows remote attackers to inject JavaScript into blog content that will execute in the domain of the Blojsom server. This update addresses the issue by performing additional validation of the user input. This issue does not affect systems prior to Mac OS X v10.4.

We downloaded and installed Mac OS X 10.4.9 client and server via Software Update on numerous Macs including: Mac mini Core Duo, iMac Core Duo, iMac Core 2 Duo, MacBook Pro Core 2 Duo, Power Mac G4 Cube and PowerBook G4. Only one minor glitch appeared during all of the installations--an AppleScript error message popped up during installation on the MacBook Pro C2D. We did not notice if it occurred during the installation of Mac OS X 10.4.9 or iPhoto 6.0.6 which were installed together on all Macs. In any case, after a reboot no issue was immediately apparent.

No Mac double booted but it took from 45 seconds to nearly 2 minutes at the gray screen with the "gear" spinning during the initial restart. Subsequent restarts were very fast.

Through modest use of the primary applications on many of the Macs, no issues surfaced. Look for our longer term usage comments in a future article. [Bill Fox & Dana Baggett]