Category Archives: End-user Focused

Guest Post: More on BYOD

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As the world of computers, mobile devices, and technology in general, continue to exponentially evolve, so too must our need and desire to secure our communications, our data, and to that end our privacy. There is hardly a day that goes by anymore that we don’t hear of some major security breach of a large corporation, but this also directly impacts the individual. We have to make a concerted effort to protect our information – particularly on our mobile devices. Our mobile devices are inherently difficult to secure because they send their data over WiFi, which is susceptible to man-in-the middle attacks. We must pursue the security of our data on our mobile devices passionately. People nowadays carry so much private and more importantly valuable information on them that we just absolutely have to protect it. Particularly in this age of BYOD (bring your own device) to work. An even more difficult realm for the infosecurity folks trying to protect their networks. How does one protect a device on a network from malicious intent? How does one keep viruses, Trojans and worms off of the networks when everyone seems to be plugged in to their devices? This article intends to describe some steps that one can take to protect their mobile device both locally by encrypting the mobile device itself and also by utilizing apps that help to secure their email and telemobile device conversations from malevolence.  

 

As noted on the previous article on State of Security released on June 17, 2014, Brent recently discussed 3 tips for BYOD, which were to get these devices off of the production networks, teach people about mobile device security, and finally use what you already have to your advantage when it comes to your own architecture when developing BYOD policies and processes.

 

There are numerous steps that the IT folks can take to help secure their networks in this age of BYOD as mentioned in our previous article, but there are also some very simple and usefultips that we can all follow that will help us in protecting our mobile devices too.

 

Every company should have policies in place regarding the use and misuse of BYOD devices. This must include encryption of the data and remote wiping of the data if the device is lost or stolen, (such as Find my iMobile device, Android Lost, Mobile Security, and Autowipe,). Assuming the BYOD device is under the company’s control.  If not then as  mentioned in the previous article getting these devices off of the production network is a must. Every  company should at least require authentication and hopefully two-factor authentication of the device.  This would allow the organization some degree of control when it comes to resetting passwords, locking the device when it’s not in use, logging, etc. If it’s not, then asking employees to adhere and sign a code of conduct with regard to their device is a must, as well as periodic employee education. A quick Google search will reveal apps that can help with two-factor authentication too. Such as RSA Secure Alternative, SMS passcode, and Duosecurity.

 

The next step is to encrypt the mobile device itself upon ending your session. Thereby protecting your information from even the apps that you currently having running on the mobile device itself. All apps go through an approval process where they are tested, validated and checked for security, but there have been times where an app passed through such a process and still contained malicious code that sent back stolen personal information to the attacker. This is a particular issue in the Android market. Companies such as Cryptanium and Arxan offer integrity protection, jailbreak detection, anti-debug detection and reverse engineering protection. So if a attacker does manage to get ahold of your device it makes it much more tamper resistant. 

 

Apps that offer encrypted communication such as voice, video, text and/or file transfers are also a consideration. Silent Circle, Redmobile device and Whisper Systems offer such encrypted communication for a fee. Wickr and Cryptocat do this too, but are free. If you are just interested in encrypted text messages (SMS) then perhaps Babel, Whisper, or Akario is for you.

 

In today’s mobile device market there are a plethora of apps many of which do what they describe when it comes to helping to protect our information. Yet as with anything else if there is a will, there is a way, this is particularly true for those that mean to steal our information. If they have a desire to acquire your information they will make a concerted effort to try to extract it from your device. It is up to us to make it as difficult as possible for them to ever get it. For now there does’t seem to be a lot of apps that actually encrypt all of your information locally to the mobile device. Or if it does offer some degree of encryption then it does so over a potentially vulnerable, networked platform. In short there is no single magic bullet that will encrypt all of your mobile devices data and communications for free, but there are some out there for a fee will offer to do so. The other issue that arises is if you use said company do they have access to the information that you were trying to protect in the first place. What’s to keep a rogue employee from accessing your data? All of this can make your head spin. The moral of the story is to make good choices, use your common sense and don’t put anything on a mobile device that you aren’t willing to share with others. Be safe out there.

 

About Preston:

Preston Kershner is new to the info-security family, where he has a variety of lateral interests in topics such as cybersecurity, information security, incident handling and response, computer forensics and malware analysis. Preston has been in the medical field for over 20 years and is currently transitioning into the infosec community. When not being an information junkie, Preston enoys spending time with his family. He also enjoys learning everything he can about astrobiology (the search for exoplanets that have a potential to habour life). You can follow Preston as he continues to expand his knowledge and experience in these realms at http://www.linkedin.com/pub/preston-kershner/3a/493/965/ & follow him on Twitter (@redman7373).

 

About Brent:

Brent Huston is the Security Evangelist and CEO of MicroSolved, Inc. He spends a LOT of time breaking things, including the tools/techniques and actors of crime. When he is not focusing his energies on chaos & entropy, he sets his mind to the order side of the universe where he helps organizations create better security processes, policies and technologies. He is a well recognized author, surfer, inventor, sailor, trickster, entrepreneur and international speaker. He has spent the last 20+ years dedicated to information security on a global scale. He likes honeypots, obscure vulnerabilities, a touch of code & a wealth of data. He also does a lot of things that start with the letter “s”. You can learn more about his professional background here: http://www.linkedin.com/in/lbhuston & follow him on Twitter (@lbhuston).

 

Disclaimer:

It should be noted that some of the apps are free, some apps are cloud-based, some are open source and some are at a cost to the consumer. In no way do we endorse the applications in this article. 


Social Engineering Even Exists in the Animal World

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OK, so we have all read about birds that social engineer other birds into raising their young, and maybe you’ve even seen the TV special about it. But, this picture brings to mind a lesson in social engineering, thanks to our friends in the animal world. It all comes down to confidence, doesn’t it? 🙂

I am pretty sure that one of these things is not like the other. Would your security team spot the difference? How about your users?

Credit: The first time I saw the pic, it was here, just in case you want to use it for awareness training. — Thanks to @robertjbennett for the pic!

NewImage

ATM Attacks are WEIRD

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So this week, while doing some TigerTrax research for a client, I ran into something that was “new to me”, but apparently is old hat for the folks focused on ATM security. The attacks against ATMs run from the comical, like when would-be thieves leave behind cell phones, license plates or get knocked out by their own sledge hammers during their capers to the extremely violent – attacks with explosives, firearms and dangerous chemicals. But, this week, my attention caught on an attack called “Plofkraak”. 

In this attack, which is apparently spreading around the world from its birth in Eastern Europe, an ATM is injected with high levels of flammable gas. The attackers basically tape up all of the areas where the gas could easily leak out, and then fill the empty spaces inside the ATM with a common flammable gas. Once the injection is completed, the gas is fired by the attacker, causing an explosion that emanates from INSIDE the ATM.

The force of the explosion tears the ATM apart, and if the attackers are lucky, cracks open the safe that holds the money, allowing them to make off with the cash and deposits. Not all attackers are lucky though, and some get injured in the blast, fail to open the safe and even torch the money they were seeking. However, the attack is cheap, fast, and if the ATM doesn’t have adequate safeguards, effective.

The collateral damage from an attack of this type can be pretty dangerous. Fires, other explosions and structural damages have been linked to the attack. Here is an example of what one instance looked like upon discovery. 

Some ATM vendors have developed counter measures for the attack, including gas sensors/neutralizing chemical systems, additional controls to prevent injection into the core of the machine, hardening techniques for the safe against explosions and other tricks of the trade. However, given the age of ATM machines in the field and their widespread international deployment, it is obvious that a number of vulnerable systems are likely to be available for the criminals to exploit.

While this is a weird and interesting technique, it did give me some reminders about just how creative and ambitious criminals can be. Even extending that into Information Security, it never ceases to amaze me how creative people will get to steal. Spend some time today thinking about that. What areas of your organization might be vulnerable to novel attacks? Where are the areas that a single failure of a security control could cause immense harm? Make a note of those, and include them in your next risk assessment, pen-test or threat modeling exercise.

Don’t forget, that just like the inventors of Plofkraa”, attackers around the world are working on the odd, novel and unexpected attack vector. Vigilance is a necessary skill, and one we need more of, in infosec. As always, thanks for reading, and stay safe out there! 

TigerTrax Quick Dives Now Expanded with Data Lenses

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Users of the TigerTrax™ Quick Dive service, our analytics and intelligence offering, have been very pleased with the new Data Lens features we have been offering to BETA clients thus far. The Quick Dive service offers short term monitoring of social media for specific forms of content and then canned analytics against the observed data. The Lens features offer several additional ways to slice & focus the analytics on specific areas of interest, such as:

  • Removal of specific terms or sentiment from the data set
  • Slicing of the data set to focus on specific terms or sentiment
  • Keyword analytics against the identified lists of URLs
  • “What if” visualizations to match scenarios

Enterprise license holders for TigerTrax will receive unlimited Lens work on their Quick Dive data sets at no additional charge. Customers purchasing ad-hoc Quick Dives may purchase Lens work against their data sets at a small additional charge per Lens. Please discuss your needs with your account executive for details.

The Lens program will continue to be expanded and we are also looking at adding the capabilities into our Deep Dive offering and our Ongoing Monitoring offering. More on that later, as we continue to work through testing the processes with those data formats. The Lens programs for those offerings will remain in BETA, while Quick Dive Lens offerings move to production as of today and we are proud to announce their immediate availability to all TigerTrax Quick Dive clients.

Want to learn more about TigerTrax or any of the offerings we offer? Click here for an overview, and talk to your account executive for more info.

Spend Your First Hour Back the Right Way – Go Malware Hunting!

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So, you’ve been out of the office for a quick holiday break or vacation. Now you face a mountain of emails and whole ton of back-logged tasks. Trust me, put them aside for one hour.

Instead of smashing through emails and working trouble tickets, spend an hour and take a look around your environment – go hunting – target malware, bots and backdoors. At a macro level, not a micro level. Were there an abnormal number of trouble tickets, outbound connections, AV alerts, IDS and log entries while you were gone? What does egress look like during that period? Were there any abnormal net flows, DNS anomalies or network issues that would indicate scans, probes or tampering on a larger scale?

Spend an hour and look for high level issues before you dig into the micro. Read some logs. See what might be getting lost in your return to work overwhelm. It is not all that uncommon for attackers to use holidays and vacations as windows of opportunity to do their nasty business.

Don’t fall victim to the expected overwhelm. Instead, use it as a lens to look for items or areas that correlate to deeper concerns. You might just find that hour invested to be the one that makes (or breaks) your career in infosec.

Good luck and happy hunting!

PS – Thanks to Lee C. for the quick edits on 7/4/14.

Touchdown Task for June: Document Cleanup

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With the beginning of a new fiscal year on the immediate horizon for many, it reminds us that it’s time to clean up our books and our filing. And by that we mean both our digital and physical files! If you don’t already have a written document retention policy, one needs to be drafted. It should be tailored to your business needs and meet the requirements identified in local, state or federal laws and regulations that apply to your particular industry. 

As a part of your document retention plan, you will establish a document retention schedule of what to keep and for how long. Once you have this identified, it’s time to dive into the files, both paper and electronic, to see what should be properly destructed. 

It is critical that paper documents are either incinerated or shredded. Electronic files must be properly sanitized and purged. Purging can be accomplished a variety of secure erasing tools. A quick Google will turn up several free or low cost solutions. Clearing electronic data is often accomplished by overwriting existing data using software that incorporates a fixed sequence of characters. 
Whatever the processes are that you elect to perform, it is imperative that you stick to the schedule and destroy your documents per your written guidelines in your document retention policy.

Thanks to Teresa West for this post.

The Big Three

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Information security techniques certainly are improving. The SANS Top Twenty Critical Controls, for example, are constantly improving and are being adopted by more and more organizations. Also, security hardware devices and software applications are getting better at a steady rate. But the question we have to ask ourselves is: are these improvements outpacing or even keeping up with the competition? I think a strong argument can be made that the answer to that question is NO! Last year there were plenty of high profile data loss incidents such as the Target debacle. Over 800 million records were compromised that we know of, and who knows how many other unreported security breaches of various types occurred?

So how are we going to get on top of this situation? I think the starkly realistic answer to that question is that we aren’t going to get on top it. The problem is the age old dilemma of defense versus attack; attackers will always have the advantage over entrenched defenders. The attackers know where you are, what you have and how you defend it. All they have to do is figure out one way to get over, under or around your defenses and they are successful. We, on the other hand, don’t know who the attackers are, where they’re at or exactly how they will come at us. We have to figure out a way to stop them each and every time – a daunting task to say the least! Sure, we as defenders can turn the tables on the information thieves and go on the attack; that is one way we can actually win the fight. But I don’t think the current ethical and legal environment will allow that strategy to be broadly implemented.

Despite this gloomy prognosis, I don’t think we should just sit on our hands and keep going along as we have been. I think we should start looking at the situation more realistically and shift the focus of our efforts into strategies that have a real chance of improving the situation. And to me those security capabilities that are most likely to bear fruit are incident detection, incident response and user education and awareness; the Big Three. Over the next several months I intend to expand upon these ideas in a series of blog posts that will delve tactics and means, so stay tuned if this piques your interest! 

Thanks to John Davis for writing this entry.

SoS Video Post Number 1: TigerTrax M&A & Threat Intel

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Today, we started trying to record our first attempt at a video blog post. Check it out and let us know what you think.

You can download it from here.

As always, thanks for reading, listening or watching… Stay safe out there! 

You can give us feedback, jeers or encouragement on Twitter (@lbhuston or @microsolved).

Federal Hacking Laws – Some Pointers

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We wanted to close out this series by pulling together some information for clients on the federal laws (US) surrounding computer intrusion and hacking. Here are some pointers for your consideration:

Internet crime is among the newest and most constantly evolving areas of American law. Although the Internet itself is more than three decades old, greater public usage began in the late 1980s with widespread adoption only following in the 1990s. During that decade the Net was transformed from its modest military and academic roots into a global economic tool, used daily by over 100 million Americans and generating upwards of $100 billion in domestic revenue annually. But as many aspects of business, social, political, and cultural life moved online, so did crime, creating new challenges for lawmakers and law enforcement. 

Crime on the Net takes both old and new forms. The medium has facilitated such traditional offenses as fraud and child pornography. But it has also given rise to unique technological crimes, such as electronic intrusion in the form of hacking and computer viruses. High-speed Internet accounts helped fuel a proliferation of copyright infringement in software, music, and movie piracy. National security is also threatened by the Internet’s potential usefulness for terrorism. Taken together, these crimes have earned a new name: when FBI Director Louis J. Freeh addressed the U.S. Senate in 2000, he used the widely-accepted term “cybercrime. 

Source

Great explanation (dated though – 2006) of Section 18 of the US code and their relevant sections to cybercrime.

The main hacking laws are in the US Computer Fraud and Abuse Act passed in 1986 and has undergone several amendments. 


Based on the history of hacking, computer problems caused as a result of hacking were continuously increasing and like recent times ethical hacking became unpopular because of the notoriety of black hats. What do you think? If these laws weren’t there, ha! Imagine what would have been happening. I like the efforts of the US government on hacking. 

Hacking laws according to the US laws(Computer Fraud and Abuse Act) states, 

Hacking Law 1 

1.Whoever having knowingly accessed a computer without authorization or exceeding authorized access, and by means of such conduct having obtained information that has been determined by the United States Government pursuant to an Executive order or statute to require protection against unauthorized disclosure for reasons of national defense or foreign relations, or any restricted data, as defined in paragraph y of section 11 of the Atomic Energy Act of 1954, with reason to believe that such information so obtained could be used to the injury of the United States, or to the advantage of any foreign nation, willfully communicates, delivers, transmits, or causes to be communicated, delivered, or transmitted, or attempts to communicate, deliver, transmit or cause to be communicated, delivered, or transmitted the same to any person not entitled to receive it, or willfully retains the same and fails to deliver it to the officer or employee of the United States entitled to receive it; 

Hacking Law 2 

2.Intentionally accesses a computer without authorization or exceeds authorized access, and thereby obtains– 

Information contained in a financial record of a financial institution, or of a card issuer as defined in section 1602(n) of title 15, or contained in a file of a consumer reporting agency on a consumer, as such terms are defined in the Fair Credit Reporting Act (15 U.S.C. 1681 et seq.); 

B.Information from any department or agency of the United States; or 

C. Information from any protected computer if the conduct involved an interstate or foreign communication;

Hacking law 3 

3. Intentionally, without authorization to access any nonpublic computer of a department or agency of the United States, accesses such a computer of that department or agency that is exclusively for the use of the Government of the United States or, in the case of a computer not exclusively for such use, is used by or for the Government of the United States and such conduct affects that use by or for the Government of the United States; 

hacking law 4 

4 Knowingly and with intent to defraud, accesses a protected computer without authorization, or exceeds authorized access, and by means of such conduct furthers the intended fraud and obtains anything of value, unless the object of the fraud and the thing obtained consists only of the use of the computer and the value of such use is not more than $5,000 in any 1-year period; 

A.Knowingly causes the transmission of a program, information, code, or command, and as a result of such conduct, intentionally causes damage without authorization, to a protected computer; 

B. Intentionally accesses a protected computer without authorization, and as a result of such conduct, recklessly causes damage; or 

C. Intentionally accesses a protected computer without authorization, and as a result of such conduct, causes damage;

Source

Reporting Cyber-Crimes:

Every day, criminals are invading countless homes and offices across the nation—not by breaking down windows and doors, but by breaking into laptops, personal computers, and wireless devices via hacks and bits of malicious code. 

The collective impact is staggering. Billions of dollars are lost every year repairing systems hit by such attacks. Some take down vital systems, disrupting and sometimes disabling the work of hospitals, banks, and 9-1-1 services around the country. 

Who is behind such attacks? It runs the gamut—from computer geeks looking for bragging rights…to businesses trying to gain an upper hand in the marketplace by hacking competitor websites, from rings of criminals wanting to steal your personal information and sell it on black markets…to spies and terrorists looking to rob our nation of vital information or launch cyber strikes. 

Today, these computer intrusion cases—counterterrorism, counterintelligence, and criminal—are the paramount priorities of our cyber program because of their potential relationship to national security. 

Combating the threat. In recent years, we’ve built a whole new set of technological and investigative capabilities and partnerships—so we’re as comfortable chasing outlaws in cyberspace as we are down back alleys and across continents. That includes: 

A Cyber Division at FBI Headquarters “to address cyber crime in a coordinated and cohesive manner”; 

Specially trained cyber squads at FBI headquarters and in each of our 56 field offices, staffed with “agents and analysts who protect against investigate computer intrusions, theft of intellectual property and personal information, child pornography and exploitation, and online fraud”; 

New Cyber Action Teams that “travel around the world on a moment’s notice to assist in computer intrusion cases” and that “gather vital intelligence that helps us identify the cyber crimes that are most dangerous to our national security and to our economy;” 

Our 93 Computer Crimes Task Forces nationwide that “combine state-of-the-art technology and the resources of our federal, state, and local counterparts”; 

A growing partnership with other federal agencies, including the Department of Defense, the Department of Homeland Security, and others—which share similar concerns and resolve in combating cyber crime.

Source

How to Report Computer Hackers 

Many computer users fall prey to hackers and the crimes they perpetrate on unsuspecting individuals and companies. If a crime occurs in your home or business, it’s not difficult to report the computer hacker. 

Determine which agency has jurisdiction over the crime. This will depend upon whether the crime was committed at your home or at your business, and the address of that particular location. If you live within city limits, the proper agency will generally be a police department in your town. If you live outside the city limits, within the county, contact your local sheriff’s office. 

Call the non-emergency phone number for your local police department or sheriff’s office to report the crime. Ask to speak with someone in the detective’s division about an Internet crime.

Source

Reporting Computer Hacking, Fraud and Other Internet-Related Crime 

The primary federal law enforcement agencies that investigate domestic crime on the Internet include: the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), the United States Secret Service, the United States Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) , the United States Postal Inspection Service, and the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms (ATF) . Each of these agencies has offices conveniently located in every state to which crimes may be reported. Contact information regarding these local offices may be found in local telephone directories. In general, federal crime may be reported to the local office of an appropriate law enforcement agency by a telephone call and by requesting the “Duty Complaint Agent.” 
Each law enforcement agency also has a headquarters (HQ) in Washington, D.C., which has agents who specialize in particular areas. For example, the FBI and the U.S. Secret Service both have headquarters-based specialists in computer intrusion (i.e., computer hacker) cases.

Ohio Laws Around Hacking

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We are often asked for specific details of the legal issues surrounding hacking, computer intrusion and other criminal acts around infosec. Specifically, many of our Ohio clients ask for specific pointers. As such, similarly to what we did a couple of weeks ago with regard to child pornography, here is some vital information about the topic.

Computer hacking in Ohio falls under unauthorized use of property. Generally this is a misdemeanor of the 4th degree. If the hacking is for the purpose of obtaining property or services and the loss is under $1000 it is a 1st degree misdemeanor. Losses between $1,000-$7,500 it is a 5th degree felony, between $7,500-$150,000 it is a 4th degree felony and over $150,000 it is a 3rd degree felony. If the victim is elderly or disabled, then computer hacking is automatically at least a 5th degree felony, depending on the circumstances. 

This information is directly from the Ohio state government website and should be the most up to date info available.

Statute 2909.04 also has a section on computer intrusion and hacking, prohibiting the aforementioned activities in so far as they may interfere with the ability of public services or emergency response.

This information was obtained here.

To report instances of computer intrusion in Ohio, citizens are directed to contact their local law enforcement/sheriff’s office. In addition, citizens and organizations should also consider notifying the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), as federal laws are also likely to apply. You can contact the FBI directly through a variety of methods detailed here. 

(NOTE: MSI is not providing legal advice of any kind, consult your attorney or council for legal advice. This material is simply meant to be a pointer for education. MSI is NOT qualified to offer legal advice under any circumstance.)