I'll suggest to those institutions that they upgrade to newer version of CentOs. I know of three that are using CentOs 5. Two of the three host other things on those servers besides IPT so they may be less inclined to change.
Laura Russell VertNet Programmer VertNet KU Biodiversity Institute 1345 Jayhawk Blvd. Dyche Hall, Room 606 Lawrence, KS 66045
Phone: +01 785 864-4681 Fax: +01 785 864-5335
email: larussell@vertnet.org email: larussell@ku.edu
Skype: laura.anne.russell Gchat: larussell@vertnet.org
url: www.vertnet.org
From: "Tim Robertson [GBIF]" trobertson@gbif.org Date: Monday, September 23, 2013 10:10 AM To: Laura Russell larussell@vertnet.org Cc: "IPT@lists.gbif.org list" ipt@lists.gbif.org, Mickael Graf Mickael.Graf@nrm.se, Anders Telenius Anders.Telenius@nrm.se Subject: Re: [IPT] Security update
Hi Laura
We use CentOS for the majority of our servers, but we're on CentOS 6.3 or 6.4 depending on where the server is in its management cycle - 6.x has been out since mid 2011. I'd suggest aiming to follow updates once or twice a year if possible. CentOS is serving us very well.
Since we're talking about upgrades, security etc - at the GBIF secretariat also prioritizing Java 7 upgrades across the board as 6 is no longer supported by Oracle (meaning it could be a security risk as issues will most likely no longer be fixed - I stop short of saying "won't be", but Oracle are saying it is now end of life: http://www.oracle.com/technetwork/java/eol-135779.html). The IPT will remain backwardly compatible for Java 6 though.
Cheers, Tim
On Sep 23, 2013, at 5:00 PM, Laura Russell wrote:
I'd be interested in knowing the outcomes of the CentOs patching as several of the institutions I support or advise on their IPTs use CentOs. I'm just getting ready to email all of them now to get to work on this.
Laura Russell VertNet Programmer VertNet KU Biodiversity Institute 1345 Jayhawk Blvd. Dyche Hall, Room 606 Lawrence, KS 66045
Phone: +01 785 864-4681 Fax: +01 785 864-5335
email: larussell@vertnet.org email: larussell@ku.edu
Skype: laura.anne.russell Gchat: larussell@vertnet.org
url: www.vertnet.org http://www.vertnet.org
From: "Tim Robertson [GBIF]" trobertson@gbif.org Date: Monday, September 23, 2013 9:53 AM To: Mickael Graf Mickael.Graf@nrm.se Cc: "IPT@lists.gbif.org list" ipt@lists.gbif.org, Anders Telenius Anders.Telenius@nrm.se Subject: Re: [IPT] Security update
Hej Mickael,
Thanks for taking action.
Can you share your catalina logs please? This could be well a conflict in dependencies or similar. We'll help diagnose. If you would rather not CC everyone, please contact Kyle and myself directly and CC only those you are happy to discuss details with.
As an aside - those OS and tomcat versions are quite ancient. There could well be other security holes in your system for other reasons, so I'd suggest scheduling some upgrades for safety reasons when it fits with your other deployments - most likely you are aware of this though.
Cheers, Tim
On Sep 23, 2013, at 4:42 PM, Mickael Graf wrote:
Dear all,
I went through the all steps and now, although I have a nice $tomcat/webapps/ipt directory I have a not so nice error 404 while trying to access the app for completing the installation. "The requested resource () is not available." it says...
I don't know if the reason is my old centos 5/tomcat 5 or an error in ipt.war, but I would bet on the latter.
Cheers Mickaël
From: ipt-bounces@lists.gbif.org [ipt-bounces@lists.gbif.org] on behalf of Kyle Braak [GBIF] [kbraak@gbif.org] Sent: Monday, September 23, 2013 12:31 To: IPT@lists.gbif.org list Subject: [IPT] Security update
Dear IPT users,
This is an important message.
IPT administrators should update their IPTs to the new version which has a security update and was released yesterday: https://code.google.com/p/gbif-providertoolkit/
The security update fixes critical vulnerabilities that have been discovered in the Apache Struts web framework, which the IPT uses.
According to this article http://www.computerworld.com/s/article/9241639/Hackers_target_servers_runnin g_Apache_Struts_apps?source=CTWNLE_nlt_security_2013-08-15 , these Struts vulnerabilities allow hackers to break into a server. It goes on to say that hackers are actively exploiting these vulnerabilities.
Simple instructions on how to update your IPT are below. If you don't have time to update your IPT immediately, I would advise you to take it offline until you can.
You can refer to this article https://www.mandiant.com/blog/responding-attacks-apache-struts2/ , which describes how to determine if you have been attacked.
Please email the IPT list directly for more help upgrading your installation.
Sincerely,
Kyle, on behalf of the IPT development team and the GBIF Secretariat
Instructions how to update IPT in Tomcat:
- Please download:
https://gbif-providertoolkit.googlecode.com/files/ipt-2.0.5-security-update-... .war 2. Backup IPT data directory somewhere safe 3. Remove ipt.war from $tomcat/webapps/ (some seconds later, the deployed /ipt folder should automatically delete) 4. Once ipt.war and /ipt have been removed from /webapps - stop Tomcat 5. Add new version to /webapps renaming it from ipt-2.0.5-security-update-1.war to ipt.war 6. Start Tomcat 7. In a browser open the application (if it doesn't appear at first, try restarting Tomcat once more). 8. When prompted for IPT data directory, enter same location as existing IPT data directory 9. Press continue, hopefully installation succeeds.
IPT mailing list IPT@lists.gbif.org http://lists.gbif.org/mailman/listinfo/ipt