Identifying mail account used in CRAM-MD5 transaction

Posted by ManiacZX on Server Fault See other posts from Server Fault or by ManiacZX
Published on 2010-03-30T21:06:08Z Indexed on 2010/03/30 21:13 UTC
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I suppose this is one of those where the tool for identifying the problem is also the tool used for taking advantage of it.

I have a mail server that I am seeing emails that spam is being sent through it. It is not an open relay, the messages in question are being sent by someone authenticating to the smtp with CRAM-MD5.

However, the logs only capture the actual data passed, which has been hashed so I cannot see what user account is being used.

My suspicion is a simple username/password combo or a user account's password has otherwise been compromised, but I cannot do much about it without knowing what user it is. Of course I can block the IP that is doing it, but that doesn't fix the real problem.

I have both the CRAM-MD5 Base64 challenge string and the hashed client auth string containing the username, password and challenge string.

I am looking for a way to either reverse this (which I haven't been able to find any information on) or otherwise I suppose I need a dictionary attack tool designed for CRAM-MD5 to run through two lists, one for username and one for password and the constant of the challenge string until it finds a matching result of the authentication string I have logged.

Any information on reversing using the data I have logged, a tool to identify it or any alternative methods you have used for this situation would be greatly appreciated.

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