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Tailscale didn't stop the Hugging Face intrusion

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Re: Tailscale didn't stop the Hugging Face intrusion

#211

Post by sandeepkd »

submitaticket wrote: post #200
sandeepkd wrote: post #180

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Agreed its a tool, and it does not looks like any vulnerability was exploited on their end. However part of the blog is confusing to me. Long lived keys vs short lived have their own space in discussion, there are use cases, pros & and cons for the same. However it is not very clear how a short lived credential would have prevented the exploit in this case?

It would not have prevented the initial exploit. The agent gained access to the K8s cluster and read the Tailscale Auth Key from Cluster Secrets. A short-lived credential would reduce the risk that the key is still valid when an agent gains access.

Thats the point, the short lived credentials would have done much other than adding more step of getting the secrets again which is why I am questioning the discussion of that in a root cause analysis itself. Adding one more layer does not increases the security by default in every case.

Re: Tailscale didn't stop the Hugging Face intrusion

#212

Post by fc417fc802 »

senordevnyc wrote: post #188
DC-3 wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you can't see the spin on corporate messaging it means it's working (and consequently, to stretch the metaphor, your wicket is in danger).

This seems unfalsifiable :)

Depends on if you can dredge up any examples of corporate statements authored without any intent to add spin.

Re: Tailscale didn't stop the Hugging Face intrusion

#213

Post by ozozozd »

apenwarr wrote: post #71
traceroute66 wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But why should insecure argument handling bugs (as per your recent SSH bulletin) be found after release ? Those are an ancient class of bugs that should be picked up by any competent security review.

Is your theory that "any competent security review" will find every security hole in a product? Because that sure would be great if it were true. Unfortunately it does not match my experience.

That was a subtle strawman.

The post you replied you clearly asked why insecure argument handling should be discovered after release. You widened that to mean “every security hole must be discovered prior to release” which made it a much easier argument to attack.

The point stands that the insecure argument handling could’ve been discovered by a security audit even when every security hole may not have been found.

Re: Tailscale didn't stop the Hugging Face intrusion

#214

Post by k8sToGo »

aborsy wrote: post #194
k8sToGo wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I use it but feel uncomfortable, that it has large attack surface and LLMs will find exploits in it Doesn't this apply to any application you use? How would it be different with plain wireguard?

No. If software is small enough, it can be proven. There is formal verification of the protocol and aspects of code: https://www.wireguard.com/formal-verification/ The code is small enough that can be reviewed.

That makes sense. Thanks!

Re: Tailscale didn't stop the Hugging Face intrusion

#215

Post by itopaloglu83 »

sandeepkd wrote: post #180
john_strinlai wrote: post #2

> No “vulnerabilities” in Tailscale were found or exploited, and that might make it even more uncomfortable for us. [...] But, we're a security tool. Their intrusion is our intrusion, and it's our job to take it seriously. im a happy customer of tailscale, so i am obviously biased, but i have a lot of respect for this. they could have just stayed quiet and i dont think anyone would have bat an eye.

Agreed its a tool, and it does not looks like any vulnerability was exploited on their end. However part of the blog is confusing to me. Long lived keys vs short lived have their own space in discussion, there are use cases, pros & and cons for the same. However it is not very clear how a short lived credential would have prevented the exploit in this case?

I read it as I should add new nodes with short lived keys and avoid long lived ones.

Yes, this doesn’t solve the issue, but also adds one more step to the chain.

The AI didn’t crack the encryption or managed to get arbitrary access. And also Tailscale makes things easier to manage than simple VPNs and firewall rules. But it still requires a decent amount of attention and careful configuration to make a perfect system.

Re: Tailscale didn't stop the Hugging Face intrusion

#216

Post by itopaloglu83 »

lukeschlather wrote: post #181
ahofmann wrote: post #46

Wow, this article is super smart marketing by tailscale. Not only do they list all the nice and expensive features, that can help in such a situation but they also show that someone at huggingface made a very stupid thing by writing a reusable auth key in an env file. Everyone using mesh VPNs like tailscale, netbird etc. knows that this is like leaving the keys right at the door.

> they also show that someone at huggingface made a very stupid thing by writing a reusable auth key in an env file I don't see where it says that. The Tailscale key specifically it says was stored in the kubernetes secret manager, and obtained once the attacker already had root on the k8s cluster, so would've had full access to all the secrets stored in a sensible fashion. They did get root by dumping the environmen…

> How did you get past security? His fortress is impenetrable. > > Door was unlocked.

Once you’re a root at a system that has the ability to add and remove nodes to a network, it’s pretty much over, at least for being able to add a Tailscale node.

Re: Tailscale didn't stop the Hugging Face intrusion

#217

Post by jasonvorhe »

vegenaise wrote: post #26
thansz wrote: post #4

As AI progress continues, it will be more difficult to stop AI intrusions and to detect them without resorting to direct AI countermeasures, which at some point will have humans out of the loop altogether. If leading and well-capitalized frontier labs can't control models or detect leakage/attacks in a reasonable time frame now , what is humanity going to do as those same labs continue in their pursuit of creating a…

it'll be moot. when we blow past 3°c in 15 years and there's widespread crop failure and billions are starving and dying, states and nations will collapse and with it industrial civ then ai and tech will be of little concern.

I think you're confusing climate change with war.

Re: Tailscale didn't stop the Hugging Face intrusion

#218

Post by farfatched »

"Tailscale is a zero trust network!"

That's the problem. Tailscale is not zero trust. Tailscale can be used to implement a zero trust architecture, with if deployed with sufficiently granular ACLs, but the most common deployment is machine-oriented, rather than service or request oriented. In which case, any process on that machine has a lot of access.

Tailscale calling itself zero trust might be what leads users to think "use Tailscale, job done".

I think Tailscale know that, which is why they barely mention locking down access ACLs.

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