[ISN] Hurwitz Group names Buffer Overflow Attacks as Threat

[Moderator: Ugh. This kind of announcement is akin to me saying in
 tomorrow's paper: "Guns are a problem plaguing our society". A few
 problems come up in this piece. 1) It's amusing to see companies make
 announcements like this some year and a half after Aleph's paper on
 Buffer Overflows. 2) Buffer overflows have existed have been actively
 exploited for years. 3) They claim to have the only automated protection
 against overflows, yet Solar Designer released a linux kernel patch
 designed to automatically prevent Overflow attacks.  4) The wild claim at
 the end of protecting against everything, including "prevent the hacking
 of Web scripts and Sendmail programs".  So now the program is protecting
 against ALL overflow attacks? I'd love to see what platforms this exists
 on, and has been thoroughly tested for. 5) The 'concrete' examples they
 list include the New York Times. Details of how the site was exploited
 have not been released as far as I have seen.]

Forwarded From: darek milewski <darekm@cmeasures.com>

http://www.news.com/Investor/NewsItem/0,213,0~3~2~Computer%20Data%20Security~MEMCF~BLO~369703770~~~~~,00.html

HURWITZ GROUP NAMES BUFFER OVERFLOW ATTACKS AS SIGNIFICANT THREAT

Business Wire
February 3, 1999, 9:25 a.m. PT

t to Web Security; MEMCO's New SECURED for
Internet Product Line Cited as Proactive Solution

Business Editors/High Tech Writers

REDWOOD CITY, Calif.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Feb. 3, 1999--MEMCO Software, Inc.
(Nasdaq: MEMCF), a leading provider of information security software,
today announced the availability of a report issued by Hurwitz Group, a
leading analyst firm specializing in strategic business applications, that
explains the danger of buffer overflow attacks to Web security. 

The report describes traditional and new approaches to preventing this
favorite hacker technique that is growing in popularity with the expansion
of the Internet. MEMCO's recently announced SECURED for Internet, a new
class of "Intrusion Prevention" products, is named in the report as
proactively stopping the problem of buffer overflow attacks. 

The Hurwitz Group report entitled "The Buffer Overflow Problem,"  explores
how corporate Internet servers have now become the most important line of
communication with customers, partners and investors. With this increased
connectivity, however, comes the real threat of criminal activity and
exploitation due to unavoidable security holes and an increased knowledge
of vulnerabilities on the part of hackers. Concrete examples of this
security threat include the recently publicized attacks on corporate Web
sites including the New York Times, the CIA and the Department of Justice.
The Hurwitz report describes MEMCO's new SECURED product line with its
patent-pending Stack Overflow Protection (STOP), and proven Dynamic
Security Extension (DSX) technologies, as a "proactive" approach to
preventing security attacks against the root or administrator account via
buffer overflow. A complete copy of the Hurwitz report is available at
www.memco.com. 

"Buffer overflow will continue to be a security problem until all system
vulnerabilities are revealed and solutions are put in place,"  said Steven
Foote, senior vice president of Hurwitz Group Inc. "MEMCO offers a
proactive solution that makes it significantly easier to protect Internet
applications by locking down critical operating system and application
resources, preventing both external and internal hacker attacks." 

"With this report on buffer overflow, Hurwitz Group has exposed a serious
obstacle for companies looking to adopt Internet technology for e-commerce
and business-to-business communication," said Eli Singer, president of
MEMCO software. "With SECURED for Internet, we have been able to
neutralize buffer overflow attacks and place control back in the hands of
our customers, enabling safe e-business." 

MEMCO's new SECURED for Internet product line protects the content and
availability of Web, email and firewall servers against hacker attacks.
This product line features MEMCO's STOP technology. 

STOP is the only automated solution that protects against stack (or
buffer) overflow attacks, a primary technique used by hackers to gain
administrator authority and unrestricted access to server content and
resources. With SECURED, companies are able to protect home pages from
unauthorized modifications, prevent the hacking of Web scripts and
Sendmail programs, and keep firewalls properly configured and running. 


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