Risk
High
Date Discovered
March 29, 2003
Description
A vulnerability in Sendmail may be exploited remotely to execute arbitrary code. The flaw is present in the 'prescan()' procedure, which is used for processing email addresses in SMTP headers. This condition has been confirmed to be exploitable by remote attackers to execute instructions on target systems. This vulnerability stems from a logic error in the conversion of a char to an integer value. The issue has been fixed Sendmail 8.12.9.
Recommendations
Deploy network intrusion detection systems to monitor network traffic for malicious activity.
Monitor system and IDS logs for anomalies. Flag any crashes or abnormal termination of the sendmail service as suspicious. Attacks would likely cause such occurrences.
Please see the referenced advisories for more information.
Credits
Discovery credited to Michal Zalewski.
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Disclaimer
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