(Again, 1Password is working to fix this, and The paper gives the example of 1Password, which has browser extensions that communicate with the main 1Password app. In OS X, apps can register and use ports to communicate to and from browsers. Ports are like apartments in an apartment building, each with a particular function. Addresses are unique to a given computer or mobile or other device.

The Internet operates using addresses and ports. Researchers performed end-to-end attacks on Evernote, WeChat, QQ, Money Control, and others listed in an appendix, and had an app approved in the App Store with this attack embedded.įor example, from the container of Evernote, our attack app, involving an XPC Service that hijacked the target app’s BID, successfully stole all the contacts of the user and her private notes from ∼/Library/Containers//account/. A malicious program can use the BID of a subsystem to get itself added to the ACL for another app’s main data container, allowing it full access. While Apple enforces uniqueness in the “Bundle Identifier” (BID) used to set up separate data storage containers in OS X, subsystems aren’t held to the same requirements. However, without substantial changes, iOS could be subject to one or two additional exploits noted if certain kinds of inter-application or system-wide data storage changes were made. The paper details four flaws, three of which are unique to OS X. We have additional fixes in progress and are working with the researchers to investigate the claims in their paper.” On Friday, an Apple spokesperson said in a prepared statement, “Earlier this week we implemented a server-side app security update that secures app data and blocks apps with sandbox configuration issues from the Mac App Store. They immediately removed them after approval, as they had had their proof of concept.

Unfortunately for Apple, the paper’s authors were able to submit and get approved apps that exploited these weaknesses. What minimizes the attack vectors presented by the researchers is that any malicious app has to get into the App Store. This is considered a “zero-day” exploit because it is immediately available to put into malware, but industry practices for disclosure were observed. The authors also say Apple asked for their paper in February. The researchers say they notified Apple in October 2014 and twice thereafter, and were told it would take six months to repair the flaws.

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