Team for Research in
Ubiquitous Secure Technology

Citation
David Brumley, Pongsin Poosankam, Dawn Song, Jiang Zheng. "Automatic Patch-Based Exploit Generation is Possible: Techniques and Implications". 2008 IEEE Symposium on Security and Privacy,, April, 2008; To appear at the 2008 IEEE Symposium on Security and Privacy, Oakland, CA.

Abstract
The automatic patch-based exploit generation problem is: given a program P and a patched version of the program P', automatically generate an exploit for the potentially unknown vulnerability present in P but fixed in P'. In this paper, we propose techniques for automatic patch-based exploit generation, and show that our techniques can automatically generate exploits for vulnerable programs based upon patches provided via Windows Update.

In many cases we are able to automatically generate exploits within minutes or less. Although our techniques may not work in all cases, a fundamental tenet of security is to conservatively estimate the capabilities of attackers. Thus, our results indicate that automatic patch-based exploit generation should be considered practical. One important security implication of our results is that current patch distribution schemes which stagger patch distribution over long time periods, such as Windows Update, may allow attackers who receive the patch first to compromise the significant fraction of vulnerable hosts who have not yet received the patch. Thus, we conclude update schemes, such as Windows Update as currently implemented, can detract from overall security, and should be redesigned.

Electronic downloads

• http://www.cs.cmu.edu/~dbrumley/pubs/apeg.html

• HTML

  David Brumley, Pongsin Poosankam, Dawn Song, Jiang Zheng.
  <a
  href="http://www.truststc.org/pubs/381.html">Automatic
  Patch-Based Exploit Generation is Possible: Techniques and
  Implications</a>, 2008 IEEE Symposium on Security and
  Privacy,, April, 2008; To appear at the <a
  href="http://www.ieee-security.org/TC/SP2008/oakland08.html"
  >2008 IEEE Symposium on Security and Privacy, Oakland,
  CA</a>.

• Plain text

  David Brumley, Pongsin Poosankam, Dawn Song, Jiang Zheng.
  "Automatic Patch-Based Exploit Generation is Possible:
  Techniques and Implications". 2008 IEEE Symposium on
  Security and Privacy,, April, 2008; To appear at the <a
  href="http://www.ieee-security.org/TC/SP2008/oakland08.html"
  >2008 IEEE Symposium on Security and Privacy, Oakland,
  CA</a>.

• BibTeX

  @inproceedings{BrumleyPoosankamSongZheng08_AutomaticPatchBasedExploitGenerationIsPossibleTechniques,
      author = {David Brumley and Pongsin Poosankam and Dawn Song
                and Jiang Zheng},
      title = {Automatic Patch-Based Exploit Generation is
                Possible: Techniques and Implications},
      booktitle = {2008 IEEE Symposium on Security and Privacy,},
      month = {April},
      year = {2008},
      note = {To appear at the <a
                href="http://www.ieee-security.org/TC/SP2008/oakland08.html"
                >2008 IEEE Symposium on Security and Privacy,
                Oakland, CA</a>},
      abstract = {The automatic patch-based exploit generation
                problem is: given a program P and a patched
                version of the program P', automatically generate
                an exploit for the potentially unknown
                vulnerability present in P but fixed in P'. In
                this paper, we propose techniques for automatic
                patch-based exploit generation, and show that our
                techniques can automatically generate exploits for
                vulnerable programs based upon patches provided
                via Windows Update. <p>In many cases we are able
                to automatically generate exploits within minutes
                or less. Although our techniques may not work in
                all cases, a fundamental tenet of security is to
                conservatively estimate the capabilities of
                attackers. Thus, our results indicate that
                automatic patch-based exploit generation should be
                considered practical. One important security
                implication of our results is that current patch
                distribution schemes which stagger patch
                distribution over long time periods, such as
                Windows Update, may allow attackers who receive
                the patch first to compromise the significant
                fraction of vulnerable hosts who have not yet
                received the patch. Thus, we conclude update
                schemes, such as Windows Update as currently
                implemented, can detract from overall security,
                and should be redesigned.},
      URL = {http://www.truststc.org/pubs/381.html}
  }
  

Posted by Christopher Brooks on 25 Apr 2008.
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