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It's good to get some more info, but it is a little disconcerting that they only mention patching Chrome. What was the sandbox escape on Android? Even if you ha
by Macha 3y ago
It's good to get some more info, but it is a little disconcerting that they only mention patching Chrome. What was the sandbox escape on Android? Even if you had code execution inside the Chrome process on Android, that shouldn't be enough to enable persistence, so clearly there's another vulnerability.
Also in this case the attack vector was MITM of http and one time links as it was a targeted campaign, but it feels there's nothing preventing someone putting this in an ad campaign or sms/discord/matrix/whatever spam and spraying it everywhere to build a botnet or steal user credentials or whatever.
- waihtis 3y agoIm not well versed in mobile environments. Presumedly breaking out of the Chrome sandbox would land you within the underlying OS. Can you not build persistence there without abusing further vulns?
- Macha 3y agoThere's nested sandboxes for browsers in mobile environments. There's the inner layer which the web content is running in, but then the browser itself is sandboxed so it can't do things like access OS APIs it doesn't have permission for, install apps that run in the background, etc. This is why the iOS example needed 3 exploits chained. The fact that a similar example worked on Android, which also has app sandboxing, implies there should be an exploit chain but we've only been told of the first.
- waihtis 3y agoGotcha, thank you.
- insanitybit 3y agoThere's also SELinux on Android.
- tester756 3y agothat sounds like terrible joke sandbox in sandbox in sandbox in sandbox in sandbox in sandbox in sandbox and stuff still manages to escape
- appplication 3y agoThat’s the thing about sand. It’s course and rough and irritating and it gets everywhere.
- hollander 3y agoBut there is always time for a glass of good wine!
- djbusby 3y agoThe Buffalo buffalo buffalo... thing https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Buffalo_buffalo_Buffalo_buffalo_buffalo_buffalo_Buffalo_buffalo https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Buffalo_buffalo_Buffalo_buff...
- taway1237 3y agoDefence in depth. Now you need a working chain of 3 exploits instead of one. It's about raising the bar, perfect security is impossible.
- codedokode 3y agoBut browsers, especially Chrome, have lots of permissions (including geolocation, accessing SD card, accessing user's personal data, camera and microphone etc.). You don't need to do anything if you can run under browser's privileges.
- roblabla 3y agoNone of the mentioned privileges should net you a persistence though, so there's clearly still another vulnerability.
- djbusby 3y agoAbove says access to SD card. I think that means write ability. Which means persistence.
- astrange 3y agoPersistence means you can write to something that'll cause your malware to run again after reboot, but external storage isn't enough to do that without another exploit in the boot path, right?
- tux3 3y agoAndroid has clamped down hard on access to the SD card. Chrome certainly doesn't have the special All Files Access, and on my device it doesn't even have Photos or Music, since I never use those permissions with Chrome, and Android regularly turns off permissions that haven't been used recently
- codedokode 3y agoBut smartphones are rarely rebooted so maybe you don't need persistence that much?
- tux3 3y agoYou still want priv escalation if you're trying to spy on someone. The content process can't see anything you're doing in other apps, and the browser can only access a very restricted view of the storage Living in memory or living off the land is generally a good idea, but you still want a chain of exploits anyways
- fullspectrumdev 3y agoOn Android, you usually need three exploits. 1. Chrome code execution (gain foothold inside Chrome process). 2. Sandbox escape (gain code execution outside the Chrome sandbox, with the privileges of the Chrome process, which aren’t very useful except to stage another exploit). 3. Local privilege escalation, usually a kernel bug or similar, to elevate to root where you can break the process “sandbox” and establish persistence.
- toasterblender 3y ago> What was the sandbox escape on Android? Even if you had code execution inside the Chrome process on Android, that shouldn't be enough to enable persistence, so clearly there's another vulnerability. This is such a crucial point. Forced to read between the lines of the blog post (because the above information is missing), it sounds like there are currently unpatched issues in Android revolving around this?
- fullspectrumdev 3y agoLikely yes, they were unable to capture the following stages so they don’t know what was exploited after gaining initial execution within the chrome sandbox. Likely there’s a chrome sandbox escape and a kernel exploit remaining “unknown and unpatched”.
- vdfs 3y ago> Likely there’s a chrome sandbox escape and a kernel exploit remaining “unknown and unpatched”. There is certainly many of those that we don't know about, if this was done in Egypt, imagine what a 3 letters agency have
- staplers 3y agoWouldn't be a stretch to assume this is forced by 3 letter agencies and it's details leaked for sale on an exclusive dark web. Think of all the insidious corruption we find out about via declassification 50 years later. It's not like human nature has changed.
- conradev 3y agoEvery government with money has exploits for every device imaginable. The going price was $1m for a full exploit chain on iPhone a while ago, and I’m sure it’s gone up, but I’m also sure it is minuscule compared to the amount of money governments have. Everyone should assume this is fact, and not imagine some secret spy world. If you ever become interesting enough to hack, you will be, and there is little recourse (currently)
- kramerger 3y agoThe article is mainly about the iphone exploit chain: Safari exploit -> PAC bypass -> kernel exploit. Android version was pretty similar but I think needed two more exploits to bypass Linux kernel mitigations. PZ has a good technical writeup.
- 3abiton 3y agoWho is PZ?
- popey456963 3y agoGoogle's Project Zero.
- Macha 3y agoThe only Project Zero write up recently about android sandbox escapes appears to be on a different, ALSA based and Samsung specific vulnerability.
- fullspectrumdev 3y agoThey state that they were unable to capture the follow-on stages of the Android chain, they only got the initial execution component. Which means there’s missing a sandbox escape and privilege elevation bug. Also yes while delivery here was apparently ISP level MiTM using lawful intercept capabilities, there’s no reason the exploit couldn’t be delivered as a 1click via a phishing link.
- nfriedly 3y agoThere are millions of android devices out there that have been abandoned by their manufacturers, so they might be omitting those details because the flaw hasn't yet been patched (and likely never will be.)
- Macha 3y agoEven with Google's own flagship device, the latest security patches date from August while this announcement is much newer, so it seems unlikely _any_ Android devices have been patched.
- flangola7 3y agoUpdates occur all the time, what do mean there's none since August?
- Macha 3y agoApps get updated but what I'm worried about is that the android image view uses libwebp which means all the apps that just ask the OS to display untrusted images are vulnerable to an update. I'm not sure the image view has been seperated out into any of the play store updated components. None of the ones name and description suggest they'll have OS UI widgets like that.
- bobviolier 3y agoI got a September security update for my Pixel 5, I think 2 days ago.
- Macha 3y agoHuh, Pixel 7 Pro here and the last update, even after a manual check, is 5 August
- kramerger 3y agoI belive you are mistaken. Firat of all, some part of Android is updated via the store. So the Chrome vulnerability and system libraries were probably updated without you noticing. Also, this started in May. Before it went public both Apple and Google had already patched some vulnerabilities. Latest round was in August/September.