ASUS EeePC with Linux hacked out of the box

February 10, 2008 |

ASUS EeePC with Linux hacked out of the box

By Jonathan Schlaffer

eeepc By now most of you have heard of the Asus EeePC, a low-cost UMPC that runs a customized Xandros (Linux). It makes use of a solid state flash drive as opposed to a standard mechanical hard drive. Now, it seems as though the EeePC and its operating system might have hit a little snag. It can be easily hacked.

If you’re looking for a review of the EeePC, we have one and a more technical take on it, even more are available elsewhere. What we didn’t count on was that there is a hole in the operating system.

RISE Security decided to check it out for themselves and discovered that the version of Xandros which ships with the EeePC runs an outdated version of Samba which is vulnerable to attack. With that information they were able to run an exploit using “Debian/Ubuntu target.”

The root attack performed was relatively easy to do, if you like command lines. Maybe Asus or Xandros could work on a patch for this. It almost makes one wonder how many other exploits are lying under the surface just waiting to be found. But, it’s not like this actually puts you in danger, just how many hackers are going to be looking for the Asus EeePC or even Xandros based system online and attack them? Probably not many.

It’s there but it’s not like you’re in any real danger. Still, the author says, “Easy to learn, Easy to work, Easy to root.” Go about your business, there’s really nothing to see here.