Ipswitch WhatsUp Gold Remote Denial of Service Vulnerability

iDEFENSE Security Advisory 09.16.04
www.idefense.com/application/poi/display?id=142&type=vulnerabilities
September 16, 2004

I. BACKGROUND

Ipswitch WhatsUp Gold is a Microsoft Windows based network monitoring
application. More information is available at

    http://www.Ipswitch.com/products/whatsup/index.html

II. DESCRIPTION

Remote exploitation of a denial of service vulnerability in Ipswitch
Inc.'s WhatsUp Gold allows attackers to cause the application to crash.

The problem specifically exists in the handling of reserved DOS device
names. By generating a GET request for 'prn.htm' to the HTTP daemon
installed by WhatsUp Gold, the application crashes and the following
Runtime Library error is displayed:

    Runtime Error!
    Program: C:\Program Files\WhatsUp\whatsupg.exe
    abnormal program termination

III. ANALYSIS

Successful exploitation allows unauthenticated remote attackers to crash
the WhatsUp Gold application, thereby preventing legitimate usage. The
WhatsUp Gold web server is not enabled by default.

IV. DETECTION

iDEFENSE has confirmed the existence of this vulnerability against
WhatsUp Gold versions 8.03 and the latest version 8.03 Hotfix 1. It is
suspected that earlier versions are also vulnerable.

V. WORKAROUNDS

Disable the WhatsUp Gold web server if it is not required.

VI. VENDOR RESPONSE

A patch to address this issue is available at:

http://www.ipswitch.com/Support/WhatsUp/patch-upgrades.html

VII. CVE INFORMATION

The Common Vulnerabilities and Exposures (CVE) project has assigned the
name CAN-2004-0799 to this issue. This is a candidate for inclusion in
the CVE list (http://cve.mitre.org), which standardizes names for
security problems.

VIII. DISCLOSURE TIMELINE

08/12/2004   Initial vendor notification
08/12/2004   iDEFENSE clients notified
08/12/2004   Initial vendor response
09/16/2004   Coordinated public disclosure

IX. CREDIT

The discoverer wishes to remain anonymous.

Get paid for vulnerability research
http://www.idefense.com/poi/teams/vcp.jsp

X. LEGAL NOTICES

Copyright (c) 2004 iDEFENSE, Inc.

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Disclaimer: The information in the advisory is believed to be accurate
at the time of publishing based on currently available information. Use
of the information constitutes acceptance for use in an AS IS condition.
There are no warranties with regard to this information. Neither the
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