Podcast
Questions and Answers
What is the primary purpose of the Special Electronic Attorney Mailbox?
What is the primary purpose of the Special Electronic Attorney Mailbox?
Which company was selected to implement the software for the Special Electronic Attorney Mailbox?
Which company was selected to implement the software for the Special Electronic Attorney Mailbox?
What notable security issue was identified with the mailbox system?
What notable security issue was identified with the mailbox system?
What was the event leading to the shutdown of the first version of the mailbox?
What was the event leading to the shutdown of the first version of the mailbox?
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How does the Special Electronic Attorney Mailbox ensure the security of its communications?
How does the Special Electronic Attorney Mailbox ensure the security of its communications?
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What issue arose when using German umlauts in messages?
What issue arose when using German umlauts in messages?
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What led to the revocation of the certificate issued by Deutsche Telekom?
What led to the revocation of the certificate issued by Deutsche Telekom?
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What was the server application used for communication with the client?
What was the server application used for communication with the client?
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What action was taken after the revocation of the certificate?
What action was taken after the revocation of the certificate?
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How did users interact with the self-signed root certificate?
How did users interact with the self-signed root certificate?
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What was one of the consequences of the erroneous handling of the certificates?
What was one of the consequences of the erroneous handling of the certificates?
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What was a unique characteristic of the domain used for local server communication?
What was a unique characteristic of the domain used for local server communication?
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Why did the client software include the private key in the server's certificate?
Why did the client software include the private key in the server's certificate?
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Study Notes
Case Study: Special Electronic Attorney Mailbox
- The electronic mailbox is used by all German attorneys for communication with courts, authorities, and other attorneys
- Communications have to be encrypted
- Timestamps are verified to meet deadlines
- The system is a large-scale IT system using a central server
- Atos IT Solutions and Services implemented the software and provides the central server
- The mailbox is not compatible with regular email
- A first version was launched on 28.11.2016
- The application was shut down due to security issues on 22.12.2017
- Second version was launched on 03.09.2018
Security Issues
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Cross-site scripting vulnerabilities
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Problems with character encoding (e.g., German umlauts)
- Messages with German umlauts could not be delivered, but the server still acknowledged the transfer
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Erroneous handling of certificates
- The client software included the server's private key, violating the Deutsche Telekom certificate policy
- The certificate was revoked
- The inclusion of the private key was due to the system design. The local host bealocalhost.de pointed to 127.0.0.1; a valid certificate, including the private key, was deployed for this domain to prevent security warnings
Further Issues
- The client implementation was based on outdated Java libraries
- Messages were not end-to-end encrypted
- Vulnerability to robot attacks
Summary
- Even large tech companies cannot prevent security issues
- Cybersecurity knowledge is very important
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Description
Explore the case study of the special electronic mailbox utilized by German attorneys for secure communication. This quiz covers the system's launch, security issues, and problems encountered with character encoding and certificate handling. Test your knowledge about the implementation and functionality of this large-scale IT system.
