Signature Detail

SMTP: Majordomo Command Execution

This signature detects attempts to exploit a known vulnerability against Great Circle Associates Majordomo, a perl-based Internet email list server. When processing a list command, Majordomo compares the "reply to" email address again the advertise/noadvertise lists (if configured). During this comparison, attackers can trick Majordomo into executing commands when it expands the back-tick operator (used by UNIX to enclose executable commands in a shell command line). Attackers can use this back-tick operator in the "reply to" email header to execute arbitrary commands on the server.

Extended Description

Majordomo is a perl-based Internet e-mail list server. Versions prior to 1.91 are vulnerable to an attack whereby specially crafted e-mail headers are incorrectly processed, yielding the ability to execute arbitrary commands with the privileges of Majordomo. This is possible only when "advertise" or "noadvertise" directives are specified in the configuration files.

Affected Products

• Great Circle Associates Majordomo 1.89.0
• Great Circle Associates Majordomo 1.90.0

References

• BugTraq: 2310
• CVE: CVE-1999-0207
• URL: http://www.securityfocus.com/archive/1/7527
• URL: http://www.greatcircle.com/lists/majordomo-users/mhonarc/majordomo-users.199708/msg00453.html
• URL: http://archives.neohapsis.com/archives/bugtraq/1994_2/0361.html