Security software firm Symantec was forced to issue
patches for vulnerabilities found in some of its popular anti-virus products
that could allow malicious hackers to use Denial of Service (DoS) attacks to
crash systems running the software and disrupting automatic protection
features.
The company posted a notice on its Web page this week that described the
two DoS vulnerabilities in the 2004 and 2005 editions of its Norton
Antivirus, Norton Internet Security and Norton System Works products.
Symantec has since patched the holes and released software updates to
users of the LiveUpdate, an automatic update service. Systems that are not
patched could be susceptible to remote attack through e-mail or the Web, the
company warned on its Web site.
The holes found in the AutoProtect feature, which were discovered by Japans IT Promotion Agency and Computer Emergency Response Team, can lead to the crash of a user’s computer.
Auto-Protect scans files sent from the Internet,
removable disks or e-mail attachments and searches for viruses, Trojans and other malicious code. The SmartScan feature allows Norton
Antivirus to scan specific types of files often associated with malicious
code, such as EXE and DOC files, according to the company.
Symantec rated the two holes as “low risks” and said the company is not
aware of any security breaches as a result of the vulnerability. Customers
were advised to run LiveUpdate for any affected products until all available
product updates are downloaded and installed.
This is the second time in a little more than a month that Symantec has
had to issue patches against a vulnerability found in anti-virus programs.
As previously reported by internetnews.com, the company released patches for a critical flaw that affects several of its anti-spam and
anti-virus products. A remote access vulnerability was identified in an
early version of the company’s anti-virus scanning module responsible for
parsing UPX compressed files used in some Symantec security products.
