PWN 2 OWN over: MacBook Air gets seized in 2 minutes flat

[kirangp]

And just think -- last year you were singing Dino Dai Zovi's praises for taking control of a MacBook Pro in nine whole hours. This year, the PWN 2 OWN hacking competition at CanSecWest was over nearly as quickly as the second day started, as famed iPhone hacker Charlie Miller showed the MacBook Air on display who its father really was. Apparently Mr. Miller visited a website which contained his exploit code, which then "allowed him to seize control of the computer, as about 20 onlookers [read: unashamed nerds] cheered him on." Of note, contestants could only use software that came pre-loaded on the OS, so obviously it was Safari that fell victim here. Nevertheless, he was forced to sign a nondisclosure agreement that'll keep him quiet until "TippingPoint can notify the vendor," but at least he'll have $10,000 and a new laptop to cuddle with during his silent spell.


Source

[praka123]

while with Vi$ta,we dont need such hacker contests!it is already open!
no problemo,even Vi$ta is secured via NSA(err...)
got built-in prob tools,a DRM which can be hacked by baddies in www,ah well Microgate$ ppl dont care all these haan?
http://www.bit-tech.net/news/2007/07...ools_exposed/1

[ThinkFree]

One of the things that Apple has always prided itself over and promoted in no uncertain terms, has been the so-called 'robust security' offered by its OSX operating system. However this supposition of Apple's took a huge beating on Thursday when a team of researchers from Independent Security Evaluators (ISE) managed to hack a MacBook Air in just two minutes using a previously unknown security vulnerability in Apple’s own safari browser. ...........................

Source

[ring_wraith]

Here's one for Aayush. But does anyone know something like this has happened before? A Mac was hacked in 30 mins.

[Faun]

who is Aayush ??

[Gigacore]

Originally Posted by T159

who is Aayush ??

http://www.thinkdigit.com/forum/members/5720.html

[xbonez]

Ha! In your face, Apple!

Originally Posted by T159

who is Aayush ??

u being sarcastic right?? who in the forum doesn't know Aayush?

[DigitalDude]

http://www.thinkdigit.com/forum/showthread.php?t=83736

ok the thread has been merged




_

[mad1231moody]

Ubuntu performed pretty well. And AFAIK that at the end it was not hacked by anyone. But surely Safari is to be blamed for the 2 minute noodle hack. Vista at least stood for some time. Man those persons must be geeks to the core. I wish I could see how they do it

[MetalheadGautham]

I wish he hadn't signed the non disclosure agreement.
Then mac users could have witnessed the horrors they never experted from their computers.

[goobimama]

Haha! This is really funny. The Vista one surprisingly survived for 2 days? Linux couldn't be hacked I hear.

[goobimama]

Well it doesn't matter to us Macboys. Not at all sire. Still, 2 minutes is a shame. Apple should take security more seriously now that it is becoming more popular...

[MetalheadGautham]

Originally Posted by goobimama

Haha! This is really funny. The Vista one surprisingly survived for 2 days? Linux couldn't be hacked I hear.

if you think this is funny, you will fall off your chair when you remember that in the recent past, the FBI Computers were hacked in a few days, that too by accident

[narangz]

WOW to Vista & Ubuntu

Flash was the culprit behind Vista's pwning.

[kumarmohit]

2 minutes flat, that's fast!

[aryayush]

Originally Posted by xbonez

u being sarcastic right?? who in the forum doesn't know Aayush?

Assuming that it was a compliment, thank you very much!

As for the original post, I have to say that it's a shame that Mac OS X was the first one to fall. Three cheers to Ubuntu though, for holding its own.

[ring_wraith]

Originally Posted by goobimama

Apple should take security more seriously now that it is becoming more popular...

Thank you! This is what I've been saying for a long long time. The only reason OS X isn't flat on its face now is that there was a very small % of people actually using it. This % was so small that it failed to attract the attention of hackers.

Now that aforementioned % is growing, its going to be fun to follow the OSX story.

[naveen_reloaded]

Actually vista was also hacked today...ie on third day of this contest...when the organizer allowed the hackers to install a legit softwar are hack the os thru it...,poor vista, but vista survived two days and stood against ubuntu , thats nice

[praka123]

source pradaan kar!:
Vista, MacBook Out--Only Linux Left in Hacking Contest


http://www.pcworld.com/article/id,14...s/article.html

[napster007]

there goes the mac...........!!

[iMav]

the onbly time i recommended some 1 to buy a mac book air i got a reply that its more vulnerable than vista .... my uncle is going to japan and i told him to get the mac book air he apparently who came to know abt this before me (lack of net for youngsters) said im happy with my vista - its more secure .... and i was like oh damn the only time i supported the mac i got pwned

[x3060]

well in the end Linux stood atleast . . good to see atleast one stood

[chesss]

Hang on!
Secunia here shows IE7 with 35% unpatched vulnerabilities and safari with nil.
So I think it can be presumed that the challenge here was to find a yet undisclosed vulnerability to own the system.
considering that windows/IE are 10x more popular than MAC/safari it becomes sort of obvious that the Mac wld fall first..
right??

[praka123]

imo,vi$ta had it made easy with drm(to crack/hack into OS)

[DigitalDude]

Originally Posted by chesss

Hang on!
Secunia here shows IE7 with 35% unpatched vulnerabilities and safari with nil.
So I think it can be presumed that the challenge here was to find a yet undisclosed vulnerability to own the system.
considering that windows/IE are 10x more popular than MAC/safari it becomes sort of obvious that the Mac wld fall first..
right??

thats actually 8 unpatched out of a total 23 vulnerabilities...

and the highest critical among the 8 has a rating of 'moderately critical' which is a mid value...

just thought would put this stuff up... cos saing 35% blandly is very alarming


_

[xbonez]

Originally Posted by goobimama

Well it doesn't matter to us Macboys. Not at all sire. Still, 2 minutes is a shame. Apple should take security more seriously now that it is becoming more popular...

Originally Posted by kumarmohit

2 minutes flat, that's fast!

the 2min thing isn't saying much actually....the guys must have worked on the hack for weeks and maybe even months...they merely implemented in two min

[aryayush]

Yeah, that's just sensationalism. But the fact that it was the first one to go down is really a shame (either that or the MacBook Air was the most coveted prize ).