Subject: Security Advisory (BEA07-179.00)
From: BEA Systems Inc.
Minor Subject:BEA Plumtree Foundation internal hostname disclosure vulnerability.
Product(s) Affected: BEA Plumtree Foundation and BEA AquaLogic Interaction

Threat level: Low
An attacker can get the internal hostname of the server hosting BEA Plumtree Foundation.

Severity: Low
This information could be useful to a malicious user attempting to gain illegal access to resources on internal systems.

A problem was identified that could potentially cause a security vulnerability in certain versions of the BEA Plumtree Foundation and BEA AquaLogic Interaction. Configuration changes are available to correct this problem (see Section II). BEA Systems treats potential security problems with a high degree of urgency and endeavors to take appropriate steps to help ensure the security of our customers’ systems. As a result, BEA Systems strongly suggests the following actions:

I. Read the following advisory.
II. Apply the suggested action.
III. If you know of any additional users interested in future security advisories, please forward them the registration instructions included in this advisory.

I. Advisory

On earlier BEA Plumtree Foundation releases, the internal hostname of the server hosting BEA Plumtree Foundation was available in every requested HTML page within HTML comments. If the user were to use the View Source feature of their browser, then the internal hostname would be visible in an HTML comment.

This advisory corrects this issue by providing configuration information to prevent the internal hostname from appearing in the HTML page in an HTML comment unless specifically enabled.

Impact and CVSS Ratings:

CVSS Severity Score: 2.3 (Low)
Attack Range (AV): Remote
Attack Complexity (AC): Low
Authentication Level(Au): Not Required
Impact Type: Partial Integrity Impact
Vulnerability Type: Access Validation
CVSS Base Score Vector: (AV:R/AC:L/Au:NR/C:N/I:P/A:N/B:N)

Complete CVSS Guide: http://www.first.org/cvss/cvss-guide.html
Online Calculator: http://nvd.nist.gov/cvss.cfm?calculator

The following versions of BEA Plumtree Foundation and AquaLogic Interaction are affected by this vulnerability

• BEA Plumtree Foundation 6.0 through service pack 1 on all platforms.
• BEA AquaLogic Interaction 6.1 through service pack 1, on all platforms.

II. SUGGESTED ACTION

BEA Systems strongly recommends the following course of actions.

BEA Plumtree Foundation 6.0

BEA AquaLogic Interaction 6.1

Use the following steps to correct this issue:

1. Shutdown the application server that is hosting the portal.

2. Edit the portalconfig.xml file located in the %PT_HOME%\settings\portal folder, and change the "MachineName" entry from the hostname to an URL as follows:
   

   Change

               <setting name="MachineName">
                     <value xsi:type="xsd:string">HostName</value>
               </setting> 
   

   to

               <setting name="MachineName"> 
                   <value xsi:type="xsd:string">SecureNameOrURL</value>
               </setting>
   

3. Restart the application server that is hosting the portal.

BEA AquaLogic Interaction 6.1 MP 1

Use the following steps to correct this issue:

1. Shutdown the application server that is hosting the portal.

2. Edit the portalconfig.xml file located in the %PT_HOME%\settings\portal folder, and change the "PerformanceComments" entry from 1 to 0 as follows:
   

   Change

               <setting name="PerformanceComments"> 
                     <value xsi:type="xsd:integer">1</value> 
               </setting> 
   

   to

               <setting name="PerformanceComments"> 
                     <value xsi:type="xsd:integer">0</value> 
               </setting> 
   

3. Restart the application server that is hosting the portal.

BEA strongly suggests that customers apply the remedies recommended in all our security advisories. BEA also urges customers to apply every Service/Maintenance Pack as they are released. Service/Maintenance Packs include a roll-up of all bug fixes for each version of the product, as well as each of the prior Service/Maintenance Packs. Service/Maintenance Packs and information about them can be found at:

AquaLogic Integration: http://commerce.bea.com/showallversions.jsp?family=ALI

Note: Information about securing AquaLogic Interaction can be found in the Deployment Guide for AquaLogic User Interaction at http://edocs.bea.com/alui/deployment/index.html. We strongly encourage you to review this documentation to ensure your server deployment is securely configured.

III. REFERENCES

BEA Systems greatly appreciates the contributions from the following professional organizations for their assistance in investigating this matter:

Adrian Pastor adrian.pastor@procheckup.com and Jan Fry jan.fry@procheckup.com from ProCheckUp Ltd www.procheckup.com

http://www.procheckup.com/Vulnerability_2007.php

IV. FUTURE SECURITY COMMUNICATIONS

If there are security-related issues with BEA product, BEA Systems generally distributes an advisory and instructions with a recommended course of action. Because the security of your site, data, and code is a high priority, we are committed to generally communicating security-related issues to our customers and partners.

All previous advisories can be viewed at http://dev2dev.bea.com/advisories/

BEA Systems has established an opt-in emailing list specifically targeted for product security advisories and notifications. As a policy, if a user has opted-in to our emailing list and there is a relevant security issue with the BEA product(s) he/she is using, BEA generally distributes an advisory and instructions via email with a recommended course of action.

ADDITIONAL USERS WHO WISH TO REGISTER FOR ADVISORY DISTRIBUTION SHOULD FOLLOW THE REGISTRATION DIRECTIONS AT http://dev2dev.bea.com/advisories

IV. REPORTING SECURITY ISSUES

Security issues can be reported to BEA Systems by sending email to secalert@bea.com or by following the directions at http://dev2dev.bea.com/advisoriesnotifications/. If BEA has validated a reported security issue, we will endeavor to assess the severity of the impact of the security issue and the likelihood of the exploitation of the vulnerability. Based on these assessments and other factors, BEA will endeavor to develop and appropriately prioritize a workaround or patch designed to reduce or eliminate the risk of the vulnerability.

If you have any questions or care to verify the authenticity of this advisory, please contact BEA Technical Support at support@bea.com

Thank you,
BEA Systems, Inc.