who is responsible for the heartbleed bug

Full Answer

What is the Heartbleed bug?

The Heartbleed bug, a newly discovered security vulnerability that puts users' passwords at many popular Web sites at risk, has upended the Web since it was disclosed earlier this week. It's an extremely serious issue, and as such, there's a lot of confusion about the bug and its implications as you use the Internet.

What is Heartbleed and how to prevent it?

Heartbleed is a security bug in the OpenSSL cryptography library, which is a widely used implementation of the Transport Layer Security (TLS) protocol. It was introduced into the software in 2012 and publicly disclosed in April 2014.

How many servers are affected by the Heartbleed bug?

Researcher estimated two-thirds of the world's servers i.e. half a million servers are affected by the Heartbleed Bug, including websites, email, and instant messaging services. 5.) HOW HEARTBLEED AFFECTS SMARTPHONES?

What does the Heartbleed vulnerability mean for You?

The security vulnerability has implications for users across the Web. Here's what the bug means for you. The Heartbleed bug, a newly discovered security vulnerability that puts users' passwords at many popular Web sites at risk, has upended the Web since it was disclosed earlier this week.

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Who was behind the Heartbleed Bug?

HeartbleedLogo representing Heartbleed. Security company Codenomicon gave Heartbleed both a name and a logo, contributing to public awareness of the issue.CVE identifier(s)CVE-2014-0160DiscovererNeel MehtaAffected softwareOpenSSL (1.0.1)Websiteheartbleed.com3 more rows

What caused the Heartbleed Bug?

The Heartbleed bug results from improper input validation in the OpenSSL's implementation of the TLS Heartbeat extension. How can we prevent similar bugs? The Heartbleed bug is a vulnerability in open source software that was first discovered in 2014.

How did they fix the Heartbleed Bug?

The fix for this problem is easy: the server just needs to be less trusting. Rather than blindly sending back as much data as is requested, the server needs to check that it's not being asked to send back more characters than it received in the first place. That's exactly what OpenSSL's fix for the Heartbleed Bug does.

How does the CVE officially refer to the Heartbleed Bug?

Heartbleed is a vulnerability in some implementations of OpenSSL. The vulnerability, which is more formally known as CVE-2014-0160, allows an attacker to read up to 64 kilobytes of memory per attack on any connected client or server.

How was Heartbleed found?

Codenomicon first discovered Heartbleed—originally known by the infinitely less catchy name “CVE-2014-0160”—during a routine test of its software. In effect, the researchers pretended to be outside hackers and attacked the firm itself to test it.

How long did it take to fix Heartbleed?

The Heartbleed vulnerability was discovered and fixed in 2014, yet today—five years later—there are still unpatched systems. The Heartbleed vulnerability was introduced into the OpenSSL crypto library in 2012. It was discovered and fixed in 2014, yet today—five years later—there are still unpatched systems.

Is Heartbleed still a threat?

The reason why Heartbleed is still out there is by no means due to a lack of patches. Most services relying on OpenSSL will have a patch available to remove the Heartbleed threat. Apply the patch and the Heartbleed threat is gone, as simple as that.

What is Heartbleed and do I need to change my passwords?

The Heartbleed bug allows anyone on the Internet to read the memory of the systems protected by the vulnerable versions of the OpenSSL software. This compromises the secret keys used to identify the service providers and to encrypt the traffic, the names and passwords of the users and the actual content.

Which type of security flaw is the Heartbleed Bug?

The Heartbleed Bug is a serious vulnerability in the popular OpenSSL cryptographic software library. This weakness allows stealing the information protected, under normal conditions, by the SSL/TLS encryption used to secure the Internet.

Who developed the original exploit for the CVE?

Stéphane ChazelasOn 12 September 2014, Stéphane Chazelas informed Bash's maintainer Chet Ramey of his discovery of the original bug, which he called "Bashdoor". Working with security experts, Mr. Chazelas developed a patch (fix) for the issue, which by then had been assigned the vulnerability identifier CVE- 2014-6271.

What versions of SSL are vulnerable to Heartbleed?

Aptly labeled as the Heartbleed bug, this vulnerability affects OpenSSL versions 1.0. 1 through 1.0. 1f (inclusive). The Heartbleed bug is not a flaw in the SSL or TLS protocols; rather, it is a flaw in the OpenSSL implementation of the TLS/DTLS heartbeat functionality.

What was affected by Heartbleed?

Heartbleed affects almost everyone If you use the internet, Heartbleed impacts you. Over half of all the websites on the internet use OpenSSL, the software affected by Heartbleed. The percentage of sites using OpenSSL is even higher when you look at web services like Dropbox, Facebook, and online banking.

What was affected by Heartbleed?

Heartbleed affects almost everyone If you use the internet, Heartbleed impacts you. Over half of all the websites on the internet use OpenSSL, the software affected by Heartbleed. The percentage of sites using OpenSSL is even higher when you look at web services like Dropbox, Facebook, and online banking.

What companies were affected by Heartbleed?

The bug, called "Heartbleed", affects web servers running a package called OpenSSL. Among the systems confirmed to be affected are Imgur, OKCupid, Eventbrite, and the FBI's website, all of which run affected versions of OpenSSL.

Which type of security flaw is the Heartbleed bug?

The Heartbleed Bug is a serious vulnerability in the popular OpenSSL cryptographic software library. This weakness allows stealing the information protected, under normal conditions, by the SSL/TLS encryption used to secure the Internet.

What is Sweet32 vulnerability?

The Sweet32 attack is a SSL/TLS vulnerability that allows attackers to compromise HTTPS connections using 64-bit block ciphers.

What is the data obtained by a Heartbleed attack?

The data obtained by a Heartbleed attack may include unencrypted exchanges between TLS parties likely to be confidential, including any form post data in users' requests. Moreover, the confidential data exposed could include authentication secrets such as session cookies and passwords, which might allow attackers to impersonate a user of the service.

What websites were affected by the 2014 hacking attack?

An analysis posted on GitHub of the most visited websites on 8 April 2014 revealed vulnerabilities in sites including Yahoo!, Imgur, Stack Overflow, Slate, and DuckDuckGo. The following sites have services affected or made announcements recommending that users update passwords in response to the bug:

Who reviewed Seggelmann's code?

Following Seggelmann's request to put the result of his work into OpenSSL, his change was reviewed by Stephen N. Henson, one of OpenSSL's four core developers. Henson failed to notice a bug in Seggelmann's implementation, and introduced the flawed code into OpenSSL's source code repository on 31 December 2011.

Is TLS vulnerable to Heartbleed?

Although the bug received more attention due to the threat it represents for servers, TLS clients using affected OpenSSL instances are also vulnerable. In what The Guardian therefore dubbed Reverse Heartbleed, malicious servers are able to exploit Heartbleed to read data from a vulnerable client's memory. Security researcher Steve Gibson said of Heartbleed that:

Can an attacker impersonate the owner of a heartbleed?

An attacker having gained authentication material may impersonate the material's owner after the victim has patched Heartbleed, as long as the material is accepte d (for example, until the password is changed or the private key revoked). Heartbleed therefore constitutes a critical threat to confidentiality.

Does Heartbleed affect certificate revocation?

Since Heartbleed threatened the privacy of private keys, users of a website which was compromised could continue to suffer from Heartbleed's effects until their browser is made aware of the certificate revocation or the compromised certificate expires.

What Is the Heartbleed Bug?

The Heartbleed bug is classified within the Common Vulnerabilities and Exposures of the Standard for Information Security Vulnerability Names maintained by MITRE as CVE-2014-0160 . It’s a buffer over-read – a case when a system allows data access that should be restricted.

What is the purpose of heartbleed vulnerability?

Prevent Heartbleed. The heartbleed vulnerability allows attackers to steal the private key of a server certificate. If the server is vulnerable to heartbleed, this means that an attacker can retrieve the private key and impersonate the server.

What does it mean when a server is vulnerable to heartbleed?

If the server is vulnerable to heartbleed, this means that an attacker can retrieve the private key and impersonate the server. Therefore secure connections to the webserver are not possible anymore. The heartbleed vulnerability was one of the most critical vulnerabilities in the last years.

What is Heartbleed?

Heartbleed is a vulnerability in OpenSSL that came to light in April of 2014; it was present on thousands of web servers, including those running major sites like Yahoo.

Why is Heartbleed called Heartbleed?

The name Heartbleed comes from heartbeat, which is the name for an important component of the TLS/SSL protocol. The heartbeat is how two computers communicating with one another let each other know that they're still connected even if the user isn't downloading or uploading anything at the moment.

How does Heartbleed work?

Heartbleed works by taking advantage of a crucial fact: a heartbeat request includes information about its own length, but the vulnerable version of the OpenSSL library doesn't check to make sure that information is accurate, and an attacker can use this to trick the target server into allowing the attacker access to parts of its memory that should remain private.

Why is Heartbleed dangerous?

Heartbleed is dangerous because it lets an attacker see the contents of that memory buffer, which could include sensitive information. Admittedly, if you're the attacker, you have no way to know in advance what might be lurking in that 20 KB you just grabbed off the server, but there are a number of possibilities.

How was Heartbleed discovered?

Heartbleed was actually discovered by two different groups, working independently, in very different ways: once in the course of a review of OpenSSL's open source codebase, and once during a series of simulated attacks against servers running OpenSSL.

Heartbleed CVE

The identifier for Heartbleed in the common vulnerabilities and exposures (CVE) system is CVE-2014-0160; you can follow that link for a wealth of information about the bug. "Heartbleed" is obviously a lot catchier, so you can understand why Codenomicon's name stuck.

Heartbleed code

A single line of code contains the mistake that gave rise to the Heartbleed vulnerability:

What organizations are beefing up their systems to protect against Heartbleed attacks?

Yesterday, Industrial Control Systems-CERT also warned the critical infrastructure organizations (like energy, utilities or financial services companies) to beef-up their systems in order to defend against the Heartbleed attacks.

How many servers are affected by Heartbleed?

Researcher estimated two-thirds of the world's servers i.e. half a million servers are affected by the Heartbleed Bug, including websites, email, and instant messaging services.

Is Heartbleed a virus?

Absolutely NO, It's not a virus. As described in our previous article, The Heartbleed bug is a vulnerability resided in TLS heartbeat mechanism built into certain versions of the popular open source encryption standard OpenSSL, a popular version of the Transport Layer Security (TLS) protocol.

Did the NSA know about Heartbleed?

But if it is so, then this would be one of the biggest developments in the history of wiretapping ever. However, the agency denied it saying NSA was not aware of Heartbleed until it was made public.

Is Heartbleed stealthy?

Well, nobody is sure at this point, because Heartbleed is stealthy as it leaves no traces behind and here the matter goes worse.

Does Android 4.1.1 have Heartbleed?

All versions of Android OS include outdated versions of OpenSSL library, but only Android 4.1.1 Jelly Bean has the vulnerable heartbeat feature enabled by default. Blackberry also confirmed that some of its products are vulnerable to Heartbleed bug, whereas Apple's iOS devices are not affected by OpenSSL flaw.

Who created Chromebleed?

The easiest way to keep you safe is to use a new add-on to the Chrome browser, Chromebleed, created by security researcher, Jamie Hoyle.

Who is the researcher of Heartbleed?

If you want the gory technical details on what Heartbleed is and how it works, visit Heartbleed.com, read this excellent but dense explanation of Heartbleed by Australian security researcher Troy Hunt or watch this video by security researcher Zulfikar Ramzan.

Which sites have been attacked by Heartbleed?

Prominent sites and services openly attacked using Heartbleed, for which you absolutely have to change passwords: Yahoo and, by association, its subsidiaries Flickr and Tumblr.

Does Heartbleed affect email?

Heartbleed mainly creates problems on Web and email servers. Windows PCs, Macs and mobile devices aren't directly affected, and antivirus software has no impact on Heartbleed. Systems administrators are scrambling to patch server software, but average Internet users have to wait it out. RECOMMENDED VIDEOS FOR YOU...

Is Microsoft affected by Heartbleed?

Believe it or not, there's some good news in all of this. Most servers that run Microsoft software weren't affected by Heartbleed, and plenty of other sites, including Apple, Amazon, eBay, Paypal and most major banks, weren't either.

Is Heartbleed a bug?

If you've been following the news for the past 24 hours, you've probably heard of the Heartbleed bug that's affecting the security of millions of websites. It's a big deal, with security experts using terms such as "catastrophic" and "devastating."

Overview

Root causes, possible lessons, and reactions

Although evaluating the total cost of Heartbleed is difficult, eWEEK estimated US$500 million as a starting point.
David A. Wheeler's paper How to Prevent the next Heartbleed analyzes why Heartbleed wasn't discovered earlier, and suggests several techniques which could have led to a faster identification, as well as techniques which could have reduced its impact. According to Wheeler, the most effic…

History

Behavior

Impact

Remediation

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