What's the scope of the vulnerability?
This vulnerability could result in a user, who had Outlook 2002 configured to use a V1 Exchange Server Security certificate for e-mail encryption, sending e-mail that the user believed to be encrypted when it in fact was not.
If an attacker were able to intercept the e-mail, the e-mail could be read as plain text, instead of being protected through encryption.
What is a digital certificate?
Digital certificates are a familiar fixture within public-key cryptography. In public-key cryptography, there are two keys: the private key, which must be kept secret, and the public key, which is intended to be shared with the world. In order for the public key to be shared effectively, there needs to be a way to learn whose it is, how it can be used, and to verify that the information is bona fide. Digital certificates provide a way to do this.
A digital certificate combines a public key with information about it - who owns it, what purposes it can be used for, when it expires, and so forth. When a user needs a digital certificate, he or she gets it from an organization known as a Certificate Authority (CA). The CA not only creates the certificate, it also digitally signs it, thereby vouching for the information in it and preventing it from being modified without detection.
What is a V1 Exchange Server Security Certificate?
A V1 Exchange Server Security certificate is one of the encryption certificate options that is available when Outlook 2002 is used in conjunction with a Microsoft Exchange mail server. In this configuration, the Exchange mail server can act as a CA and issue certificates to the Outlook clients. One type of certificate it can issue is the V1 Exchange Server Security certificate - however the default certificate type in this configuration is an S/MIME certificate.
Is there a flaw in V1 Exchange Server Security certificates?
No - it is important to recognize that the flaw is in the way Outlook handles this type of certificate, and not in the certificates themselves.
You've mentioned S/MIME - what is it?
S/MIME stands for Secure/Multipurpose Internet Mail Extensions. S/MIME provides a consistent way to send and receive MIME encoded data securely. Based on the popular Internet MIME standard, S/MIME provides the following cryptographic security services for electronic messaging applications: authentication, message integrity and non-repudiation of origin (using digital signatures) and privacy and data security (using encryption).
For a description of S/MIME and information about digital certificates, see Microsoft Knowledge Base article Q195724, RFC 2633 section 1, and the article Working with the Outlook 2000 Security Model.
Is S/MIME affected by this vulnerability?
No - this vulnerability is restricted to situations where V1 Exchange Server Security certificates are being used for encryption.
How do I tell what type of certificate Outlook is using to send and receive encrypted e-mail?
You can tell what type of certificate Outlook 2002 is using for encryption by checking Tools|Options|Security|Security Settings. If the security settings show that the "secure message format" is "Exchange Server Security," then Outlook 2002 is using a V1 Exchange Server Security certificate.
You've talked about encryption, but certificates can be used for digitally signing e-mail as well. Is this application of certificates affected?
No, digital signing is unaffected - this vulnerability only affects encryption using Exchange Server Security certificates.
What causes the vulnerability?
The vulnerability results because Outlook 2002 does not correctly use V1 Exchange Server Security certificates when such certificates are selected for encryption. The result of the error is that the e-mail message is not encrypted
What's wrong with encryption in Outlook 2002 when the V1 Exchange Server Security Certificate is used?
There is a flaw in the way Outlook processes a request to use the V1 Exchange Server Security certificate to encrypt an e-mail message. As a result of this flaw, the certificate is not used properly and the message is sent in plain text.
What could this vulnerability enable an attacker to do?
It would allow an attacker who had the ability to intercept e-mail messages between two parties to read those e-mails even if the parties believed them to be encrypted.
How could an attacker exploit this vulnerability?
To exploit this vulnerability, an attacker would need to have the ability to intercept e-mail between parties who were using V1 Exchange Server Security certificates for encryption, or have access to the infrastructure where those e-mails were being stored, such as access to mail servers. Given this access, an attacker could read e-mails that users believed to be protected by encryption.
What does the patch do?
The patch eliminates the vulnerability by ensuring that Outlook 2002 uses the V1 Exchange Server Security certificate correctly when it is selected as the certificate to be used for encryption operations.
