From owner-freebsd-hackers@FreeBSD.ORG Sun Apr 3 15:17:25 2005 Return-Path: Delivered-To: freebsd-hackers@freebsd.org Received: from mx1.FreeBSD.org (mx1.freebsd.org [216.136.204.125]) by hub.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 20D1416A4CE for ; Sun, 3 Apr 2005 15:17:25 +0000 (GMT) Received: from spider.deepcore.dk (cpe.atm2-0-53484.0x50a6c9a6.abnxx9.customer.tele.dk [80.166.201.166]) by mx1.FreeBSD.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 578DC43D46 for ; Sun, 3 Apr 2005 15:17:24 +0000 (GMT) (envelope-from sos@DeepCore.dk) Received: from [194.192.25.143] (laptop.deepcore.dk [194.192.25.143]) by spider.deepcore.dk (8.13.3/8.13.3) with ESMTP id j33FH4vJ002892; Sun, 3 Apr 2005 17:17:04 +0200 (CEST) (envelope-from sos@DeepCore.dk) Message-ID: <42500894.1050400@DeepCore.dk> Date: Sun, 03 Apr 2005 17:15:32 +0200 From: =?ISO-8859-1?Q?S=F8ren_Schmidt?= User-Agent: Mozilla Thunderbird 1.0 (X11/20050116) X-Accept-Language: en-us, en MIME-Version: 1.0 To: ALeine References: <200504031452.j33EqbMG078325@marlena.vvi.at> In-Reply-To: <200504031452.j33EqbMG078325@marlena.vvi.at> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1; format=flowed Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable cc: freebsd-hackers@FreeBSD.ORG Subject: Re: ATA security commands, bug in atacontrol X-BeenThere: freebsd-hackers@freebsd.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.1 Precedence: list List-Id: Technical Discussions relating to FreeBSD List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , X-List-Received-Date: Sun, 03 Apr 2005 15:17:25 -0000 ALeine wrote: > Recent c't magazine article "At Your Disservice - How ATA security func= tions > jeopardize your data", which you can find at the URL below, warns about= the > dangers of ATA security commands. Specifically, a malicious attacker wi= th > sufficient access could render a disk useless to the legitimate owner o= f > the disk by setting the 32 byte user and master passwords using the ATA= > security command 0xf1. >=20 > http://www.heise.de/ct/english/05/08/172/ >=20 > To prevent such attacks in case of compromise one can issue the ATA sec= urity > freeze lock command 0xf5, which disables further ATA security commands = until > the next cold boot. Software for issuing the ATA security freeze lock c= ommand > has been made available at the URL below. >=20 > http://www.heise.de/ct/ftp/projekte/atasecurity/ >=20 > There is a patched version of the Linux hdparm utility there, but the c= 't > guys seem to have neglected the BSD world, they have not even mentioned= the > fact that OpenBSD's atactl(8) already supports this command as well as = all > the other ATA security commands, as can be seen at the URL below. >=20 > http://www.openbsd.org/cgi-bin/cvsweb/src/sbin/atactl/ >=20 > Currently FreeBSD's atacontrol(8) has no support for ATA security comma= nds, > so I would like to know if adding the ATA security features is a priori= ty > on the TODO list. I would like to see these features implemented and I = would > also be willing to port the code from OpenBSD if there are some more > experienced kernel developers who would be willing to review my code an= d > commit it? Let me know. Right, I did see that article but I've not settled on how if at all to=20 deal with it. The by far most secure method would be to have ATA issue=20 the freeze command ASAP in the probe/attach code, thats about one line=20 of code :) At any rate atacontrol is not the place to put it if we want this to up=20 security... --=20 -S=F8ren