Drivers the root cause
Intel this week issued a vulnerability notice affecting all Centrino laptops. The vulnerability notice comes just right behind a report that a team of security researchers at Black Hat revealed a method to circumvent the security of Apple's MacBook laptops by penetrating the system wirelessly at the driver level. Black Hat says the attack is based on the fact that Wi-Fi drivers are poorly tested and designed.
Intel is warning that drivers used with its Centrino platform pose a security threat, and that customers using Centrino based laptops either contact their respective manufacturers for an updated driver, or download one directly from Intel's website. Intel's website indicated "an attacker could potentially exploit these vulnerabilities which could potentially lead to remote code execution and system control."
The security notice also mentioned that drivers supplied by Microsoft for Centrino notebooks are vulnerable. From the notice:
Security vulnerabilities have been identified in the Microsoft
Windows drivers for the Intel® 2200BG and 2915ABG PRO/Wireless Network
Connection Hardware (w22n50.sys, w22n51.sys, w29n50.sys, w29n51.sys),
which could potentially be exploited by attackers within range of the
Wi-Fi station to execute arbitrary code on the target system with
kernel-level privileges. These flaws are due to a memory corruption
while parsing certain frames.
"If they're going to pirate somebody, we want it to be us rather than somebody else." -- Microsoft Business Group President Jeff Raikes
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