Title

McAfee VirusScan Access Protection: Common Standard Protection must be set to prevent termination of McAfee processes. (Cat II impact)

Discussion

Many malicious programs have attempted to disable VirusScan by stopping services and processes and leaving the system vulnerable to attack. Self-protection is an important feature of VSE that prevents malicious programs from disabling VirusScan or any of its services or processes. Many trojans and viruses will attempt to terminate or even delete security products. VSE's self-protection features protect VirusScan registry values and processes from being altered or deleted by malicious code. This rule protects the McAfee security product from modification by any process not listed in the policy's exclusion list.

Check Content

Note: If the HIPS signature 3892 is enabled to provide this same protection, this check is not applicable. From the ePO server console System Tree, select the Systems tab, select the asset to be checked, select Actions, select Agent, and select Modify Policies on a Single System. From the product pull down list, select VirusScan Enterprise 8.8.0. Select the policy associated with the Access Protection Policies. Under the Access Protection tab, locate the "Access protection rules:" label. In the "Categories" box, select "Common Standard Protection". Ensure "Prevent termination of McAfee processes" (Block and Report) options are both selected. Criteria: If "Prevent termination of McAfee processes" (Block and Report) options are both selected, this is not a finding. Registry keys are not available for this setting. To validate from client side, access the local VirusScan console by clicking Start->All Programs->McAfee->VirusScan Console. Under the Task column, select Access Protection, right-click, and select Properties. Under the Access Protection tab, locate the "Access protection rules:" label. In the "Categories" box, select "Common Standard Protection". Ensure both "Prevent termination of McAfee processes" (Block and Report) options are selected. Criteria: If both "Prevent termination of McAfee processes" (Block and Report) options are selected, this is not a finding.

Fix Text

From the ePO server console System Tree, select the Systems tab, select the asset to be checked, select Actions, select Agent, and select Modify Policies on a Single System. From the product pull down list, select VirusScan Enterprise 8.8.0. Select the policy associated with the Access Protection Policies. Under the Access Protection tab, locate the "Access protection rules:" label. In the "Categories" box, select "Common Standard Protection". Select both "Prevent termination of McAfee processes" (Block and Report) options. Select Save.

Additional Identifiers

Rule ID: SV-216954r395499_rule

Vulnerability ID: V-216954

Group Title: SRG-APP-000033

Expert Comments

CCIs tied to check.

Controls tied to check. These are derived from the CCIs shown above.