Flood ACK packets cause an IBM SecureWay FireWall DoS

From: Mauro Flores (mafloresat_private)
Date: Wed Oct 09 2002 - 06:42:34 PDT

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    Title: Flood ACK packets cause an IBM SecureWay FireWall DoS.
    
    Released: 9th Oct 2002
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    Vulnerable:
    ===========
    - SecureWay 4.2.x on AIX
    
    Overview:
    =========
    	SecureWay is a robust FireWall product developed by IBM who works over AIX
    an Windows plataform. Is not a full fledged stateful packet filter, but more
    like a stateful-inspection with connection-centric deterministic-filtering firewall.
    
    There exists an stack problem with malformed TCP packets that can lead 
    SecureWay to a DoS condition. To reach this condition a big band width is require.
    
    Details:
    ========
    When an all zeroed flags TCP packets is sent to the SecureWay FireWall, this 
    recognize the invalid packet only after a lot of procesing has been done. Because
    of this, a flood of this forged packeges consumes a lot of resources and can lead
    the IBM SecureWay FireWall to a deny of services condition.
    
    To reach the DoS condition the flood must be over 2.8 Mbps, so this is more a
    DDoS attack.
    
    On servers running SecureWay, the standar AIX fix does not work.
    
    Vendor Response:
    ================
    IBM was contacted on July 14, 2002. The vendedor confirm the problem and release 
    a fix.
    
    Corrective Action:
    ==================
    Update to SecureWay Firewall 4.2.2 version or install APAR IR49046. 
    ftp://testcase.software.ibm.com/aix/fromibm/firewall/fwaixfilter4_421d*
    
    Vulnerability Reporting Policy:
    ===============================
    http://www.ietf.org/internet-drafts/draft-christey-wysopal-vuln-disclosure-00.txt
    
    
    Author: Mauro Flores (mafloresat_private)
            Guillermo Freire (gfreireat_private)
    
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