Another difficulty is if you're running an unsupported release you might think CA wouldn't write a fix for your release and you might not ask them about alternatives to plug the hole. This bug's been out there ever since the 1990's product releases.
An alternative fix for this particular hole requires nothing more than you doing a CMS ERASE command. I'm unable to subscribe to CA hyper fixes, whenever I've logged in and tried to subscribe, their website responds with: " SUPPORTCONNECT ERROR: Error encountered while processing your request. We have logged the problem and are investigating. Please try again later. Thank you for your patience." -----Original Message----- From: VM/ESA and z/VM Discussions [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of O'Brien, Dennis L Sent: Friday, October 28, 2005 3:27 PM To: [email protected] Subject: Re: How to handle security hole? CA used to have mailing lists for Hiper fix notifications. I haven't received such a notice in so long that I don't know if there haven't been any Hipers, I fell off the list, or the list was discontinued. I'd expect to be notified immediately if a product that we use had that kind of security exposure. I understand if CA doesn't want to discuss the details, but I need to know that there's a problem. Dennis O'Brien Bank of America "You can have peace, or you can have freedom. Don't ever count on having both at the same time." -- Robert A. Heinlein -----Original Message----- From: VM/ESA and z/VM Discussions [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Romanowski, John (OFT) Sent: Friday, October 28, 2005 11:12 To: [email protected] Subject: How to handle security hole? I alerted Computer Associates (CA) to a security hole in one of their VM products that let's any VM userid control a VM system that runs this product. CA wrote a fix. If your VM system's running this product without the fix then it has this security hole active now. The security hole is installed by default and there's no product installation step or configuration parameter that closes the hole. CA and I have agreed to disagree on how well they alert their customers to the existence of security-related fixes for VM products. My question to all is would you rather CA labeled VM product fixes as security-related or not? Is security thru obscurity better? -------------------------------------------------------- This e-mail, including any attachments, may be confidential, privileged or otherwise legally protected. It is intended only for the addressee. If you received this e-mail in error or from someone who was not authorized to send it to you, do not disseminate, copy or otherwise use this e-mail or its attachments. Please notify the sender immediately by reply e-mail and delete the e-mail from your system.
