Security flaw in wireless client used in some Pocket PC devices identified

Security firm Airscanner has discovered a flaw in the way the Windows Mobile Odyssey client manages the WEP key information. The wireless driver included with the Dell X50 Pocket PC stores WEP keys as plaintext in the registry. The keys
KEY4=6677889900, KEY3=1122334455, KEY2=eeffddeeff, KEY1=aabbccddee are stored in the registry as

[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Comm\TIACXWLN1\Parms]
"HTCWEPDefaultKey4"=hex:01,00,00,00,66,77,88,99,00,8c,f6,36,1d,af,90,17,5b,00,f6,36,1d,af,00,00,00
"HTCWEPDefaultKey3"=hex:01,00,00,00,11,22,33,44,55,8c,f6,36,1d,af,90,17,5b,00,f6,36,1d,af,00,00,00
"HTCWEPDefaultKey2"=hex:01,00,00,00,ee,ff,dd,ee,ff,8c,f6,36,1d,af,90,17,5b,00,f6,36,1d,af,00,00,00
"HTCWEPDefaultKey1"=hex:01,00,00,00,aa,bb,cc,dd,ee,8c,f6,36,1d,af,90,17,5b,00,f6,36,1d,af,00,00,00

Airscanner says this could be a problem if the handheld is lost or borrowed. Since this information is stored as plaintext, anyone could read it and gain access to the WEP protected network registered with this device. This has not yet been tested with other devices that use the Odyssey client.

Originally the problem was thought to be within the Odyssey client used on these Pocket PC, but Funk Software, developers of the Odyssey client commented: "Odyssey encrypts all sensitive information that it stores in the registry. The example registry settings are not even from the area of the registry that Odyssey uses.

It is possible that the WEP keys you cite were stored by the NIC driver. An old practice, apparently not yet abandoned, is for NIC drivers to save the last configured WEP keys, so that they can be re-instantiated on reboot. Thus, when Odyssey sets the operational WEP keys for the adapter, the NIC driver might be storing them in its own area of the registry."