I don’t think we properly referenced Rowhammer attacks anywhere? Where should this go?
It turns out DDR4 ain’t so protected after all.
Rowhammer exploits that allow unprivileged attackers to change or corrupt data stored in vulnerable memory chips are now possible on virtually all DDR4 modules due to a new approach that neuters defenses chip manufacturers added to make their wares more resistant to such attacks.
Rowhammer attacks work by accessing—or hammering—physical rows inside vulnerable chips millions of times per second in ways that cause bits in neighboring rows to flip, meaning 1s turn to 0s and vice versa. Researchers have shown the attacks can be used to give untrusted applications nearly unfettered system privileges, bypass security sandboxes designed to keep malicious code from accessing sensitive operating system resources, and root or infect Android devices, among other things.
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Research published on Monday presented a new Rowhammer technique. It uses non-uniform patterns that access two or more aggressor rows with different frequencies. The result: all 40 of the randomly selected DIMMs in a test pool experienced bitflips, up from 13 out of 42 chips tested in previous work from the same researchers.
“We found that by creating special memory access patterns we can bypass all mitigations that are deployed inside DRAM,” Kaveh Razavi and Patrick Jattke, two of the research authors, wrote in an email. “This increases the number of devices that can potentially be hacked with known attacks to 80 percent, according to our analysis. These issues cannot be patched due to their hardware nature and will remain with us for many years to come.”
Considering network-based attacks are feasible, this is a major issue to put it mildly i.e. they don’t need local access to your machine or to fool you into running dodgy code on websites or via apps.
This is a hacker’s delight for advanced adversaries since it blows apart any sandboxing, VM separation etc.
In normal use qubes are created on, and changes written to, the disk. There is also extensive logging and signs of the qube are scattered in a number of places. Sometimes, you want to create a qube which does not leave these traces.
You can do this relatively simply, by creating a RAM based storage area and using it for a new storage pool. The qube will persist until the RAM disk is deleted, or the machine is shut down.
A script like this in dom0, will create tmpfs RAM disk, create a new storage pool, and create a new qube using that pool.
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You can remove the qube, and some of the associated artifacts by script in dom0.
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None of this is forensically reliable, although it is better than using a standard pool. (Refer to this issue, particularly if you are using Xfce, and check the associated issues.) Also, the scripts themselves will be on the disk, which may require some explanation.
Given it is scripts in dom0, users would have to do that manually, but it’s probably worth referencing this procedure here for advanced users (although I haven’t yet tested it for Whonix 16):
I installed a messaging app in whonix-ws-16 to message over Tor. Typically I use a Debian template for the messenger app but decided to use the whonix ws template for a more robust Tor connection.
The messaging app uses the default system font to display emojis. The current default whonix font is extremely limited. Even a simple displays as a white box.
Is the default whonix workstation font customized from within the VM template or is there a setting in dom0?
Is there a relatively secure way to install a custom font or should it be avoided?
I presume we should warn somewhere to not install custom fonts i.e. might be a fingerprinting vector? But I’m not sure - I gather it is a legitimate risk i.e. detectable by external sites etc?
Indeed. It may or may not be remotely fingerprintable but consider the user is prefering this font in non-anonymous and anonymous VMs then reduces anonymity set by posting screenshots with support requests for both. In either case, for an abundance of caution it is best avoided to even avoid the question.
Kicksecure homepage, wiki and forums is now online.
Sorting out Whonix vs Kicksecure wiki contents will be a major effort. Design:
Distinct project branding Whonix vs Kicksecure to avoid users confusing one for the other.
The goal is to define “Kicksecure is an upstream of Whonix”. The same in other words: “Whonix is based on Kicksecure.”
Minimal duplication of Kicksecure vs Whonix wiki contents.
Kicksecure wiki having everything related security. Nothing on anonymity except perhaps a mention “Users interested in anonymity might have a look at Whonix, which is based on Kicksecure.”:
Whonix wiki having everything related to anonymity.
Kicksecure wiki being independent.
Whonix wiki linking to Kicksecure wiki for security related topics.
I want to fix XFCE → Xfce proper case-sensitive but I need to change/correct the files names spelling in Whonix source code in a future build. Hence, it’s not fixed everywhere yet.
Now that kicksecure.com is online, there are two recommended host operating systems for Whonix:
Kicksecure, or
Qubes OS
While migrating Disable TCP and ICMP Timestamps to Kicksecure wiki I was wondering what to do with instructions on how to disable TCP and ICMP timestamps on other Linux such as Debian, MacOS and Windows. I think keeping this documentation is too much and should be rejected. If someone wants better security like an operating system that disabled TCP and ICMP timestamps by default, use either Kicksecure or Qubes OS as a host operaging system.
Documenting the same for Debian, MacOS, Windows and even OpenBSD is stretching the project focus too thin. It’s a bit similar like the Debian wiki explaining how to do something on Windows or the MacOS website explaining how to do something on Debian.
The only documentation on Windows, MacOS will be how to install VirtualBox and import Whonix. That is useful to first time Linux users to try out Whonix but for better security these host operating systems are a lost cause. Instructions how to disable TCP and ICMP timestamps would be incomplete in the bigger picture since there would be a lot more host security settings (such as disabling telemetry) that should’t be part of Whonix wiki. Becuase the other way around, we’d also have to host full instructions on how to harden a Windows or MacOS host operating system which would be huge.
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Re: kicksecure wiki & existing documentation on Whonix website.
I don’t agree wtih the principle re: removing wiki pages on Whonix that are common to both and redirecting readers to the other website:
Readers often don’t read the existing documentation on whonix.org as it stands (just look at forum posts re: people often asking basic questions that are already answered in docs i.e. haven’t done their homework). Splitting across two websites will just increase that problem.
Better IMO to have one “complete” set of documentation in one place for simplicity and as a definitive security and privacy guide.
The kicksecure site can remain very simple and just get occasional page updates to match whonix.org documentation as required i.e. focused on security as you pointed out.
The vast majority of the user population is likely to remain focused on Whonix for many years to come → kicksecure is a novelty at present that is unlikely to have a large, standalone user base.
Whonix is well known, but the kicksecure base not so much.
Etc.
On that basis, I would reject those suggested edits that is redirecting certain pages to kicksecure.com
Sure - will have a look.
Also, re: Kicksecure logo.
I like the last two:
Small padlock with full text; or
Just the wording with the nice, weird “K”
If I had to choose, probably #1.
Will get to other recent, suggested edits when I have a chance. Christmas time is busy…
For many it’s “issue → ask somewhere”. I don’t think it would make a difference.
Problem is, there are ~ 70 repositories on Whonix · GitLab. Security / anonymity all mixed up. The security parts cannot get as much outside attention if mixed up with anonymity. By a clean separation of projects, I hope things will look less daunting and easier to grasp.
Documentation in Whonix wiki would be complete because Whonix /wiki/Documentation would continue to have a complete overview even some links are to an external website, i.e. Kicksecure wiki.
Some problems:
Lots of duplication for things which are the same for Kicksecure and Whonix
Hard to keep track of backporting improvements from one wiki to the other wiki, especially if both versions have been edited independently
Occasional page updates in the KIcksecure would be harder than one might imagine. Many Whonix wiki pages are 95-99% unspecific to anonymity and about security only. But the remaining 1-5% anonymity specific content would make these pages unfit for unmodified copy/paste into Kicksecure wiki.
By not filling up Kicksecure wiki with relevant documentation for users and security features developer documentation, restricting the project to have minimal documentation, would be kinda maintaining the project with handbrakes on.
I am expecting the Kicksecure user base to exceed the Whonix user base since it’s simpler to use, no VMs required, the computer security enthusiasts community being a magnitude bigger than the anonymity enthusiasts community, no slow browsing speeds and all the anonymity knowledge not required.
Unfortunately these edits are ongoing and already done according to my instructions for 3 weeks.
No more need to add links (onion). Easy to illustrate the alternative onion link by using the new link template. There are no longer extraneous links to the web archive for onion links (which would be broken since web archive does not support onion links).
displays as a white box.
