CVE-2005-1218

published 2005-08-10

CVE-2005-1218: The Microsoft Windows kernel in Microsoft Windows 2000 Server, Windows XP, and Windows Server 2003 allows remote attackers to cause a denial of service (crash)…

Priority P3 36 medium 5 CVSS 2.0

AV N AC L Au N C N I N A P

EXPLOIT

The Microsoft Windows kernel in Microsoft Windows 2000 Server, Windows XP, and Windows Server 2003 allows remote attackers to cause a denial of service (crash) via crafted Remote Desktop Protocol (RDP) requests.

Affected

7 ranges

Vendor	Product	Version range	Fixed in
microsoft	windows_2003_server	—	—
microsoft	windows_2003_server	—	—
microsoft	windows_2003_server	—	—
microsoft	windows_2003_server	—	—
microsoft	windows_2003_server	—	—
microsoft	windows_2003_server	—	—
microsoft	windows_2003_server	—	—

Detection & IOCs extracted from sources · hover to see the quote

port 3389↗

cookie Cookie: mstshash=Administr↗

filename rdpwd.sys↗

bytes↗

03 00 00 27 22 E0 00 00 00 00 00 43 6F 6F 6B 69 65 3A 20 6D 73 74 73 68 61 73 68 3D 41 64 6D 69 6E 69 73 74 72 0D 0A

bytes↗

03 00 00 27 22 E0 00 00 00 00 00 43 6F 6F 6B 69 65 3A

bytes↗

000002020000

• → Exploit targets TCP port 3389 (RDP) with crafted connection requests containing a malformed or oversized 'Cookie: mstshash=' field followed by padding bytes (0x41), triggering a kernel crash in rdpwd.sys. ↗
• → The exploit sends an RDP X.224 Connection Request PDU (TPKT header 03 00, followed by E0 class byte) with a 'Cookie: mstshash=' value that is fuzzed/overflowed; monitor for anomalously large or malformed mstshash cookie values in RDP negotiation packets. ↗
• → Presence of the SPIKE fuzzer script file 'remoteass.spk' on a host or in network traffic is a strong indicator of exploitation attempts against CVE-2005-1218. ↗
• → The crafted RDP packet sequence includes a second packet with integer value 0x0500 and a third packet starting with bytes 000002020000; detecting this multi-packet sequence on port 3389 is indicative of the exploit. ↗

• · The exploit was specifically tested against Windows XP SP2; the vulnerability also affects Windows 2000 Server and Windows Server 2003 per the NVD advisory, so detection rules should not be scoped to XP alone. ↗
• · The SPIKE fuzzer is used to generate the malicious packets; the exploit file is a SPIKE script (.spk), meaning the actual byte patterns sent may vary depending on fuzzer iteration (s_string_variable fields are mutated), so static byte signatures may not catch all variants. ↗

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