Another shopping-cart back door revealed

British Net security outfit Cerberus has discovered a backdoor password in the McMurtrey-Whitaker Win32 shopping cart.

The executable cart32.exe has coded into it a weak password which can be used to view other passwords, enabling an attacker to modify the cart to run arbitrary commands on a server, and so easily gain access to customers' credit card details.

A second weakness enables an intruder to change the admin password without knowing the current one. Both holes were the result of McMurtrey-Whitaker's desire to facilitate customer support by enabling the recovery of lost passwords, company support technician Lauren Willard told The Register. Those features were not available to customers and not documented, Willard said.

In its haste to gain notoriety in an age of hacking media-hype, Cerberus posted an advisory which identifies the password and explains in detail how best to exploit both holes.

It also suggests a possible fix, recommending that customers open the executable with a hex editor and replace the default password with one of their choosing. To accommodate the technically squeamish, L0pht Heavy Industries has hacked out a quick, self-executing patch to make changing the password easy.

To accommodate the paranoid, they have also posted the source code. Cerberus posted its advisory without first contacting McMurtrey-Whitaker, normally a standard practice. "Due to the severity and seriousness of this issue, Cerberus has taken the rare step of making this information publicly available before the vendor has provided a patch," the company says. Yeah, right. It wouldn't be serious if Cerberus hadn't splashed it all over the web.

We call it low exploitation and cheap self-promotion. The advisory doesn't heighten security, but actually jeopardises it, Willard notes. McMurtrey-Whitaker will distribute a new build with all its holes bunged on Friday or Monday, she said. ®

Related Coverage Shopping-cart back door gives author admin privileges
Weenie jibe in FrontPage leaves MS web servers wide open
Hacking credit cards is preposterously easy
Online store security holes let hackers buy at cut price