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Well this is frightening. You don't even need to create subdomains since basically anyone with wildcard subdomains enabled can do this without a sweat. All you
by eksith 14y ago
Well this is frightening. You don't even need to create subdomains since basically anyone with wildcard subdomains enabled can do this without a sweat. All you need is a random number generator and rewrite x.domain.com to domain.com and the browser is none the wiser.
Though I can't quite imagine why anyone would want to do this to some random stranger. Unless you knew the visitor or had some means of personally identifying him/her, there are more devastating ways of filling up a remote HD with just an IP and hostname (nmap and friends come to mind).
- loeg 14y agoSorry, maybe this is obvious, but — how do you fill up a remote HD with just an IP and hostname with nmap and friends?
- eksith 14y agoWell, I meant you can use these tools to gain access to the remote machine to do some real damage. Nmap and friends are usually for finding running services, list of open ports, knock on a few doors (run some queries?) etc... and if someone were to gain access to a machine this way, filling up their hard drive may not be on their list of priorities. Unless incrimination was the intention.
- mkjones 14y agoCompromising an up-to-date machine is usually a bit harder than just pointing nmap at it and enumerating running services. Getting someone to visit a web site is relatively easy.
- tripzilch 14y agoReally. I assumed you were talking about some nmap-based attack I hadn't heard of. That maybe fills the target's HD with log files or something. Wondered whether that would work cross-platform on any device, like this attack. Wondered whether it could be pulled off by an idiot with a grudge, like this attack. Or whether targeting someone by IP isn't in fact actually harder than being able to do it by getting someone to click on any link, anywhere. But yes, indeed, if the machine's already vulnerable to something else, then that is possibly much worse.
- deelowe 14y agoI don't think this is as easy or as common as you think it is. For one, almost every computer is behind a firewall these days and remote vulnerabilities for common services aren't anywhere near as common as they used to be.
- jacobr 14y agoPretty bad for a company if someone injects a HD-filling script to their site.
- eksith 14y agoSo then this would really be handy in a mud-slinging campaign. Maybe against a competitor. Any visitors would be treated to a massive drain on storage and other delights, but then the victim would still need to have multiple subdomains and/or wildcard subomains enabled.
- JoachimSchipper 14y agoMeh, just Goatse'ing them works pretty well too, no need to get fancy about it.
- ricardobeat 14y ago> anyone with wildcard subdomains enabled i.e. nobody. why the hell is webkit not following the standard here? they even implemented a permission dialog so you can allow an app going over quota.
- rjh29 14y agoWildcard subdomains are ridiculously common on the web (unless I've misread you?) Blogspot, tumblr, tripod, basically anywhere using HTTP/1.1 Host-based routing of requests.
- tripzilch 14y ago> Though I can't quite imagine why anyone would want to do this to some random stranger. You must be new to the internet? > Unless you knew the visitor or had some means of personally identifying him/her, there are more devastating ways of filling up a remote HD with just an IP and hostname (nmap and friends come to mind). There's a few things: This works by sending someone a link. So you can target people without knowing their IP. It's also so easy a kid could do it. Therefore, kids will do it, just to "fuck with eachother's shit". Not to mention, they'll do it to the school and the library, etc etc. There's also enough people doing things "for the lulz". Spam this link to a thousand people, crash a few PCs, hur hur hur. Again, the fact that it's browser-based and not IP-based allows for different types of attacks. They can spam specific communities and fora they don't like or are at odds with. .. By the way, when I ran that site in Opera, it asked me whether I wanted to grant the site extra storage space, which I declined. I didn't feel like testing it in Chrome and crashing my things right now, but am I correct in assuming Chrome would not ask for this extra storage space, but simply take it, without any kind of upper limit?
- bzbarsky 14y agoYou are correct about what Chrome would do, yes.
- _puk 14y agoAnything that crashes the browser in a predictable way is pretty worrying. The approach to runaway scripts would work quite well here.. This Page is filling up your hard drive, do you want to a) crash, b) clear all data from this domain
- ceejayoz 14y ago> Though I can't quite imagine why anyone would want to do this to some random stranger. I'm going to guess you've never been Goatse'd.