Dear list members,
because of the feedback the Technical Board received after our last
email regarding the changed behavior of media objects, we had a new and
fruitful discussion on the matter.
As an immediate/intermediate solution, it is now possible do define a
black list of file extensions in the administration of media objects.
Files of type 'html' are forbidden by default now. You would be required
to change this setting in case HTML files are important for your scenarios.
If you still plan to allow HTML files and are afraid of the security issue:
* It should NOT be possible to steal the user's session cookie because
session cookies in ILIAS are marked as 'httponly' and cannot be accessed
by JavaScript code located in the uploaded HTML files (media objects).
* Nevertheless the user's session cookie will STILL be sent in case a
malicious script requests (e.g. via AJAX/XmlHttpRequest) ILIAS
server-side scripts, so these requests are sent in the context of the
user to whom the media object is presented.
As a medium-term solution, the Technical Board highly appreciates and
supports the introduction of methods like 'Subdomain Isolation'
(presented by Pascal Grube last year) which ensures both: The
possibility to upload HTML/JavaScript files and a certain level of
security. We will get in contact with stakeholders interested in funding
and further pushing the implementation of this.
Best regards,
Michael Jansen
on behalf of the ILIAS e.V. and the Technical Board
Dear list members,
a security issue has been identified (big thanks to Nicolas Schäfli) and
fixed for ILIAS versions >= 5.0.
It was possible to upload HTML files as media objects (e.g. in wiki
pages) which could be used to inject JavaScript.
According to the Jour Fixe decision the responsible component maintainer
introduced some changes regarding the handling of HTML files uploaded as
media objects.
Jour Fixe, FEB 13, 2017: "To patch this problem we decided to prohibit
the upload of HTML and the interpretation of HTML in media objects for
5.0 to 5.2."
If *.html files are uploaded they are always renamed to *.sec now
(similar to the handling of executables). The rendering has been
deactivated. Existing *.html files (uploaded before the patch) are not
rendered anymore, but there isn't a concept of deleting/renaming these
files, yet.
Best regards,
Michael Jansen
on behalf of the ILIAS e.V. and the Technical Board
Dear list members,
a security issue has been identified (big thanks to Thomas Hufschmidt)
and fixed for ILIAS version 5.0 and 5.1. For version 5.2.0, the issue
was already fixed at the time it was released.
The vulnerability was located in the QTI import of *-choice questions
with images used as answer options and existed since the initial
implementation of QTI export/import.
We advise strongly to update your ILIAS installation to the latest
version (5.0.19, 5.1.15). For more detailed explanations don't hesitate
to contact me.
Best regards,
Michael Jansen
on behalf of the ILIAS e.V. and the Technical Board
