Whatsapp 4G VIP SCAM – Technical Analysis

This is a short blog post describing about a recent hoax pertaining the WhatsApp 4.0 version. I would like to clearly highlight that there is no such application as ‘Whatsapp 4G‘. The version promises users  unrealistic features video calling, new whatsapp themes, delete sent messages from both sides etc

The following is how the message is being propagated:

 

Technical Analysis

Upon visiting the link you would be taken to a page where you would be asked to invite 15 friends before you can download the version, upon clicking the invite button, it would use WhatsApp scheme (whatspp://) in order send messages to your friends, and hence you would be promoting a hoax on behalf of the scammers:

The entire business logic is based upon the following client side script – http://new-4g-whatsapp.ga/invite.js.

Upon examining invite.js it was discovered that the code sets a cookie and checks if 15 invites have been sent on the client side:

 

Once, the counter has reached up to 15 invites or above, you would be redirected to the download link:

From the above source code, if the value of c is greater or equal to ’15‘, window.location.href would be set to “ur” variable which hosts the following download link – http://ta3.co/new-4G-whatsapp/install.php

The installation link seems to be dead, normally in such scams you would be asked to fill in surveys or installing *free apps* which would not be free as they might be shipped with Malware/adwares.

Update (Whatsapp Gold)

A new variation of Whatsapp 4G VIP scam has recently came into notice with name of “Whatsapp Gold”, which basically works on the same principle as above. The only thing that has changed the interface design and name.

Joomla 3.4.5 Critical SQL Injection Vulnerability Found

 

SQL injection found in joomla 3.4.5

The Joomla team just fixed a new Joomla version (3.4.5) to fix some serious security vulnerabilities in joomla. The most critical one is a remote and unauthenticated SQL injection on the com_contenthistory module (included by default) that allows for a full take over of the vulnerable site complete database.By using this vulnerability Joomla site database can be hacked completely.





Joomla – one of the most popular open source Content Management System (CMS) software packages for website development, has reportedly patched three critical vulnerabilities in its software package.This is the complete Tutorial for this joomla sql injection vulnerability.

The flaws, exist in the Joomla version 3.2 to 3.4.4, include SQL injection vulnerabilities that could allow hackers to take admin privileges on most customer websites and they can hack complete joomla site database.

The patch was an upgrade to Joomla version 3.4.5 and only contained security fixes which are recently patched.

The vulnerability, discovered by Trustwave SpiderLabs researcher Asaf Orpani and Netanel Rubin of PerimeterX, could be exploited to attack a website with SQL injections.

SQL injection (SQLi) is an injection attack wherein a black hack can inject/insert malicious SQL commands/query (malicious payloads) through the input data from the client to the application.

The vulnerability is one of the oldest, most powerful and most dangerous flaw that could affect any website or web application that uses an SQL-based database.

The recent SQLi in Joomla discovered by Orpani are:

  • CVE-2015-7297
  • CVE-2015-7857
  • CVE-2015-7858
  1. Exploit the vulnerability to gain the administrator session key
  1. On executing the request on Joomla site returns the admin session key
  1. Using the admin key to hijack the session and further gaining:
  • Access to the /administrator/ folder
  • Administrator privileges
  • Access to the administrator Control Panel

CVE-2015-7857 enables an unauthorized remote attacker to gain administrator privileges by hijacking the admin session. Once exploited, the attacker may gain full control of the website and execute additional attacks.

The vulnerability discovered in a core module that doesn’t require any extensions, therefore, all the websites that use Joomla versions 3.2 (released in November 2013) and above are vulnerable.

Researchers also discovered the related vulnerabilities, CVE-2015-7858 and CVE-2015-7297, as part of their research.

Actually the Joomla code resided in /administrator /components /com_contenthistory/ models/history.php was vulnerable to SQL injection.

Orpani came across many weak links in this code, that could:

Vulnerability in DRUPAL

The popular CMS Drupal has also patched an Open Redirect vulnerability in the Overlay module in its Core project (7.x versions prior to 7.41).

The Overlay module in Drupal core project displays administrative pages as a layer on the current page, rather than replacing the page in the browser window.

However, the module doesn’t sufficiently validate URLs prior to displaying their contents, which leads to an open redirect vulnerability, according to Drupal’s official blog.

joomla released officially :-

Joomla! 3.4.5 is now available. This is a security release for the 3.x series of Joomla which addresses a critical security vulnerability. We strongly recommend that you update your sites immediately. This release only contains the security fixes; no other changes have been made compared to the Joomla 3.4.4 release.

The vulnerability affected the site users with administrative rights; i.e. if only the “Access the administrative overlay” permission is enabled the vulnerability could be exploited.

The fix for the open redirect vulnerability was released and required the sites to upgrade to Drupal version 7.41.You can patch your Drupal from official drupal website.

If you were not aware of these vulnerabilities, do not panic you can fix your CMS now!