On 23.03.2013 I visited The Netherlands to give the keynote speak about Joomla! web security. I talked about the most common 8 ways a Joomla! website can get hacked. So you should check the presentation if you are a Joomla! hacker that knows less than 8 ways :) It will be useful for you. However, if you are a Joomla user that doesn’t know anything about how to hack a Joomla!, or even worse, how to protect your Joomla! from being hacked, you should definitely check the slides! Because there is a way to protect yourself from each of the common Joomla hacks that I revealed them in the presentation.
I went through the following scenarios and what should be done to prevent each of them:
- Hacked through outdated Joomla!/extensions/themes.
- Hacked through a vulnerable extensions/themes, that is not outdated
- Hacked with the help of stolen/weak login details
- Hacked through outdated/vulnerable server software - Apache, PHP, MySQL.
- Hacked through incorrectly configured web server
- A completely healthy site hacked through another vulnerable Joomla that is hosted on the same server
- Hacked because of incorrect Joomla permissions
- Hacked through malware on local PC which allows attackers to access a healthy site
2. Daniel Kanchev
7+ Years of Joomla! experience
5 Years with SiteGround
Security Freak
Performance Guru @SG
VIP Customer Management
Server Migration Specialist
Love FOSS
Addicted to extreme sports
Before we begin …
@dvkanchev
11. More info on the hack
• All versions before 3.1.5 and 2.5.14
are vulnerable
• Can be executed by anybody, no
admin rights needed
• The attacker can obtain full access to
Joomla! and its surrounding
userspace
12. More info on the hack
Joomla!!
http://goo.gl/8YwZIk!
!
Sucuri!
http://goo.gl/WjLKGm!
!
SiteGround!
http://goo.gl/NWkZTz
19. • Your site is up to date
• Your extensions are up to date
• But you still get hacked…
• Wonder why?
Here’s a Scenario:
20. Extension vulnerabilities
• Sometimes when vulnerability in an extension is
found, it takes the extension developers too
much time to fix it.
• Therefore it’s always good to use a WAF!
• WAF = Web Application Firewall
28. -Nicholas Dionysopoulos
“Templates are software, not just a bunch of graphics.
Template developers do release security upgrades all the
time. Make sure you install them. I've seen many sites getting
hacked because of a dated template with a SQL injection or
XSS vulnerability.”
29. Example
RocketTheme SQL injection in their modules!
!
http://www.rockettheme.com/blog/extensions/1300-important-security-
vulnerability-fixed
!
34. On April 9th we got hit by a huge brute
force attack towards many Joomla!s
35. … and we blocked more than 92,000 IPs in total across our
network in just
Bots used more than a thousand
different IPs per server to scan for
passes…
36. In 12 hours we blocked more than 15
million login requests
But still, we thought many passwords were guessed
37. And we were shocked how many passwords we found.
We then tried to brute force our clients
ourselves.
38. Over 40% of our customers used
Really Weak passwords.
39. Username is admin
Let me show you how easy it is to
guess a dumb password, say:
“pass123”
40. So in less than 10 seconds I’ve got
your password
41. Tip: Change your password to a full
sentence (from a favourite book) - it’s easy
to remember and hard to guess like:
!
“I love to watch the sunset.”
42. admin2 is not acceptable too ;) Try with:
!
yourname_@dm1n
Tip 2: Change your
username!
43. Tip 3: Additionally secure your
administrator login page
• Allow access only from certain IP addresses
• Add Captcha
• Password protect the administrator folder
• Use secret URL parameters
57. So let’s recap…
• Update your Joomla!
• Update your extensions. Read security bulletins ones in a while.
• Update your themes. Don’t forget that!
• Use strong passwords and non default admin usernames.
• Make sure your server side software is current (PHP, Apache, MySQL)
• Make sure your server side software is correctly setup
• Use correct file permissions for Joomla!
• Watch up for that sneaky malware