Account lockout can be bypassed, exposing the account to a brute-force password attack

Subject: Security Advisory (BEA08-197.00)
From: BEA Systems Inc.
Minor Subject: Account lockout can be bypassed, exposing the account to a brute-force password attack
Product(s) Affected: WebLogic Server and WebLogic Express

Threat level: Medium
Password lockout resulting from invalid login attempts can be bypassed.

Severity: Medium
A successful brute-force password attack may result in unauthorized access to protected user accounts.

A problem was identified that could potentially cause a security vulnerability in certain versions of WebLogic Server. Patches 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

In order to avoid brute force credential attacks, WebLogic Server has a mechanism that locks the corresponding user account after a certain number of invalid login attempts. By default, the account is locked after 5 invalid login attempts and remains locked for 30 minutes.

Even after a user has been locked out, logon requests to certain carefully constructed URLs can still give hints as to whether the password is correct or not. This allows a sophisticated attacker to successfully run a brute force password attack, a dictionary attack, or other similar attacks.

The patch associated with this advisory corrects the problem. All sites that use servlets are vulnerable to this problem.

Impact and CVSS Ratings:

CVSS Severity Score: 6.8 (Medium)
Attack Range (AV): Network
Attack Complexity (AC): Medium
Authentication Level (Au): None
Impact Type: Unauthorized uploading of files. Partial confidentiality, integrity and availability violation
Vulnerability Type: Elevation of Privilege
CVSS Base Score Vector: (AV:N/AC:M/Au:N/C:P/I:P/A:P)

Complete CVSS Guide: http://www.first.org/cvss/cvss-guide.html
Online Calculator: http://nvd.nist.gov/cvss.cfm?calculator&version=2

The following versions of WebLogic Server and WebLogic Express are affected by this vulnerability

WebLogic Server 10.0 released through Maintenance Pack 1, on all platforms
WebLogic Server 9.2 released through Maintenance Pack 2, on all platforms
WebLogic Server 9.1 on all platforms
WebLogic Server 9.0 on all platforms
WebLogic Server 8.1 released through Service Pack 6, on all platforms
WebLogic Server 7.0 released through Service Pack 7, on all platforms

II. SUGGESTED ACTION

BEA Systems strongly recommends the following course of actions.

WebLogic Server 10.0

Upgrade to WebLogic Server and WebLogic Express 10.0 Maintenance Pack 1.
Use the Smart Update tool to install the 10.0MP1 patch for CR328282.

WebLogic Server 9.2

Upgrade to WebLogic Server and WebLogic Express 9.2 Maintenance Pack 2.

Use the Smart Update tool to install the 9.2MP2 patch for CR328282.

WebLogic Server 9.1

Use the Smart Update tool to install the 9.1 patch for CR328282.

WebLogic Server 9.0

Install the 9.0 GA Combo patch from support.bea.com by requesting Bug ID CR239280.
Install the patch from:
ftp://anonymous:dev2dev%40bea.com@ftpna.bea.com/pub/releases/security/CR328282_900.jar
Place the jar for the patch at the end of the PATCH_CLASSPATH.

WebLogic Server 8.1

Upgrade to WebLogic Server and WebLogic Express 8.1 Service Pack 6.
Install the patch from:
ftp://anonymous:dev2dev%40bea.com@ftpna.bea.com/pub/releases/security/CR328282_81sp6.jar
Place the jar for the patch in the CLASSPATH before the weblogic.jar file

WebLogic Server 7.0

Upgrade to WebLogic Server and WebLogic Express 7.0 Service Pack 7.
Install the patch from:
ftp://anonymous:dev2dev%40bea.com@ftpna.bea.com/pub/releases/security/CR328282_70sp7.jar
Place the jar for the patch in the CLASSPATH before the weblogic.jar file.

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

WebLogic Server: http://commerce.bea.com/showallversions.jsp?family=WLS

WebLogic Platform: http://commerce.bea.com/showallversions.jsp?family=WLP

Note: Information about securing WebLogic Server and WebLogic Express can be found at: http://edocs.bea.com/wls/docs100/security.html. Specific lockdown information is provided at http://edocs.bea.com/wls/docs100/lockdown/index.html. We strongly encourage you to review this documentation to ensure your server deployment is securely configured.

III. REFERENCES

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

Ramón Pinuaga (rpinuaga@s21sec.com), from S21sec , http://www.s21sec.com

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 and notifications 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

V. 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/advisories. 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.

Security Advisories and Notifications

I. Advisory

II. SUGGESTED ACTION

III. REFERENCES

IV. FUTURE SECURITY COMMUNICATIONS

V. REPORTING SECURITY ISSUES