Source: Michael Flippo via Alamy Stock Photo

The leak online of exploit code for an apparent Windows zero-day flaw dubbed "BlueHammer" could be the sign of a larger issue that security researchers face when collaborating with Microsoft on vulnerability disclosure.

Using the alias "Chaotic Eclipse," a researcher anonymously published a blog post on April 2 that contained a GitHub link for the exploit, expressing annoyance with Microsoft for an insufficient response to its disclosure of the flaw. 

"I was not bluffing Microsoft and I'm doing it again," the researcher wrote in the blog post. A companion post on an X account with the same alias also heralded the release of the exploit with a link to the blog post, claiming at the time of writing, "the vulnerability is still unpatched."

The researcher also implied that he had an unsatisfactory interaction with Microsoft's Security Response Center (MSRC) about the disclosure of the flaw, but did not specific exactly what happened. "I'm just really wondering what was the math behind their decision, like you knew this was going to happen and you still did whatever you did," he wrote as part of a README on the GitHub post.

Related:Every Old Vulnerability Is Now an AI Vulnerability

Systemic Problem With Bug Disclosure?

This apparent lack of patience with Microsoft comes as no surprise to Dustin Childs, head of threat awareness at Trend Micro's Zero Day Initiative (ZDI), who said his company has had "similar frustrations with the MSRC in the past, too."

"I've heard from more than one researcher who has said they don’t work on Microsoft bugs anymore because the disclosure process is too frustrating," Childs tells Dark Reading.

Researchers and cybersecurity vendors have criticized Microsoft for years over the software giant's vulnerability disclosure program and its lack of transparency in disclosing certain cloud flaws. In fact, Microsoft made vulnerability disclosure and transparency a core pillar of the company's Secure Future Initiative (SFI) in 2023 and later touted improvements in those areas.

In an emailed statement, Microsoft said it has a customer commitment to investigate reported security issues and update impacted devices to protect customers as soon as possible. The company also stressed its support of coordinated vulnerability disclosure to protect both customers and the security research community. 

BlueHammer Vulnerability Details

The zero-day flaw combines a time-of-check to time-of-use (TOCTOU) race condition and path confusion in Windows Defender’s signature update system, according to an advisory from the Retail & Hospitality-Information Sharing and Analysis Center (RH-ISAC). If exploited successfully, a local user can access the Security Account Manager (SAM) database, obtain password hashes, and eventually gain administrator rights using the pass-the-hash technique, which would give the attacker full system control.

Related:NIST Revamps CVE Framework to Focus on High-Impact Vulnerabilities

Childs tells Dark Reading that the proof-of-concept (PoC) exploit posted by Chaotic Eclipse are both legitimate but he is not sure "how exploitable it will be in practice." 

Will Dormann, principal vulnerability analyst at Tharros, said in a post on social media platform Mastodon that the exploit works on a desktop system, while other researchers cited said it does not currently work on Windows Server.

Childs says this could be because "there are mitigations and differences on server platforms that are not present on client platforms." "I also believe the exploit is not 100% reliable, which is why some people may be experiencing different results," he adds. "Reliability in exploits is hard." 

Indeed, the researcher who posted the PoC acknowledged in their notes on GitHub that the exploit may have flaws that could prevent it from working, which they said will be fixed at a later time. Chaotic Eclipse said in an X post on Wednesday that Microsoft updated the code, which "didn't fix the bugs but makes exploitation slightly harder to detect."

Related:Privilege Elevation Dominates Massive Microsoft Patch Update

Take Zero-Day Flaws Seriously

Since details remain scant about the flaw, it makes it difficult for defenders to mitigate affected systems until Microsoft acknowledges and patches it. Indeed, mitigation should be top of mind for unpatched flaws, as attackers are always scanning for vulnerabilities that they can exploit in the wild. The release of public exploit code makes vulnerable systems even more susceptible to compromise. 

Microsoft zero-day flaws in particular are popular targets for attackers, and often are the basis for significant waves of cyberattacks, especially on enterprise systems. In a blog post on Wednesday, managed security service provider Cyderes warned that a skilled threat actor will likely be able to resolve any issues with the PoC exploit, and that ransomware gangs and advanced persistent threat groups (APTs) typically deploy such exploits "within days of release."

While they wait for the flaw to be patched, organizations using Windows in their IT environments should continue to practice sound security hygiene, warn their employees to be wary of social engineering that could allow an attacker to obtain system credentials, and monitor for any unusual activity on their systems to prevent compromise, security experts said.

Don't miss the latest Dark Reading Confidential podcast, Security Bosses Are All in on AI: Here's Why, where Reddit CISO Frederick Lee and Omdia analyst Dave Gruber discuss AI and machine learning in the SOC, how successful deployments have (or haven’t) been, and what the future holds for AI security products. Listen now!

About the Author