Vulnerability Analysis Blog

The Kill-Bit (or "killbit") is a Microsoft Windows registry value that prevents an ActiveX control from being used by Internet Explorer. More information is available in Microsoft KB article 240797. If a vulnerability is discovered in an ActiveX control or COM object, a common mitigation is to set the killbit for the control, which will cause Internet Explorer to block use of the control. Or will it?

Hi, it's Will. As previously mentioned, we have been investigating and discovering ActiveX vulnerabilities over the past few years. Today we released the Dranzer tool that we have developed to test ActiveX controls.

Hey, it's Will. I noticed that several blogs, including Trend Micro and McAfee, have been talking about the recent attacks on the Internet Explorer 7 vulnerability that was fixed in MS09-002. An interesting thing about these exploits is the attack vector. The technique used in these attacks has several security impacts that may not be immediately obvious.

It's Will again, with the first blog entry of 2009. Our Securing Your Web Browser document describes how to make your web browser more secure, but applying all of the necessary changes can be a bit tedious. To make the process easier, we developed reference implementations of the guidelines for both Microsoft Internet Explorer and Mozilla Firefox.

Hi, it's Will. Recently, a blog author reported that the CERT^® Secure Coding Standards website, which runs on Atlassian Confluence, contained a SQL injection vulnerability. After analyzing the report and discussing it with the Confluence vendor, we have concluded that the behavior described is not a vulnerability.

Hey, it's Will. Earlier this year, details about "carpet bombing" attacks were released. Apple addressed the issue by prompting users before downloading files, but recent news indicates that Google Chrome, which is based on Apple's WebKit code, is also vulnerable to the same type of attack. However, some people seem to be missing an aspect of the attack that affects all web browsers.

Hi, it's Will. Anybody who has been keeping an eye on the US-CERT Vulnerability Notes has probably noticed that I've published a lot of ActiveX vulnerabilities. So it should be no surprise to learn that we have been testing ActiveX controls and discovering vulnerabilities in the process.

Hi, it's Will again. ActiveX vulnerabilities seem to be getting a lot of attention lately. However, Java applets are also a concern.

Hey, it's Will. As you may already be aware, there is active exploitation of a vulnerability in Adobe Flash. So, it's a good idea to make sure that you have the latest version of Flash Player, which, at the time of this writing, is 9.0.124.0. Even if you think that you are up to date, can you be sure?

Hi, Ryan Giobbi from the Vulnerability Analysis team making this post. The CERT/CC has been tracking cross-site scripting vulnerabilities for a long time, and the actual vulnerabilities haven't changed much over the years. However, some technology that was developed to make life easier can actually be exploited to expand the impact of a cross-site scripting attack.