Which Logs are Security Logs?

This was originally posted on my RSA Conference Blog

Many of the security logging discussions center about the following topics:

1-      Log Collection

2-      Log Transport

3-      Log Storage

4-      Log Taxonomy

5-      Log Analysis / Correlation

6-      Log Protection / Security

These are all good topics but a very important topic is rarely discussed, and it is usually the most important one:

What are the security logs?

It is easy to work with security devices (Firewall, IDP, DLP, AV etc), their logs/alerts are classified as security logs, but what about regular applications or infrastructure components that are not build as a “security device” or security in mind? Do we need to process all logs from these devices? Which logs are more important?  Which logs go to “security” queue?

Let’s go with example, if you are the security architect, what would you recommend to a system owner who came up with a new application that writes the logs to a flat file or a database? Even if the logs are shipped to a syslog collector or an OS log queue; does it change the question?

The question is same “Which” logs? What do you want?

Here is a quick check list of activities to ask for the logs:

1-      Logs for all access (User, Admin, Service, Application etc)

2-      Logs for all changes (changes in monitored files, configurations, hardware,software – MACD logs)

3-      Logs for critical transactions in the applications

4-      Logs from user repository (e.g if AD, LDAP, RADIUS is used) access, change and transaction logs from user repository

5-      Logs for anomalies (changes in baseline activity, failed attempts, unexpected connections etc)

Since a security architect cannot know all applications, this is a good start to communicate with 3^rd party developers and application/system owners for security log generation.

For a structured approach here are a few good reads to start with:

NIST 800-92, Guide to Computer Security Log Management

http://csrc.nist.gov/publications/nistpubs/800-92/SP800-92.pdf

Common Event Expression White Paper (also has a history on other initiatives)

http://cee.mitre.org/docs/Common_Event_Expression_White_Paper_June_2008.pdf

Watch Your Logs! Quick intro

http://www.issa.org/Library/Journals/2007/July/Malatesti%20-%20Watch%20Your%20Logs.pdf

Microsoft's The Security Monitoring and Attack Detection Planning Guidehttp://www.dabcc.com/documentlibrary/file/MicrosoftreleasesanewSecurity,MonitoringandAttackDetectionWhitepaper.pdf

Reminder: PCI DSS 2.0 is asking for Vulnerability Risk Rating

You know the story; if your systems/applications store transmit or process credit card data, you must meet PCI data security standards.

Since Q4 2010 all PCI shops are aware that their Cardholder Data Environments need a risk ranking procedure.

But, What is it and how does it change current practices?

PCI DSS Requirement 6.2 says "Establish a process to identify and assign a risk ranking to newly discovered security vulnerabilities"

And a new recommendation may certainly effect how you manage risk…

This recommendation (which will be a requirement by June 30, 2012) can be classified as Risk Management 101, and yet it may change several cornerstones of your processes.

Here is what 6.2.a is asking for:

1- Check your processes for identifying new security vulnerabilities (make sure you have one)

2- Assign risk ranking to identified vulnerabilities

6.2.b Continues with the  recommendation that you use and outside source for this risk ranking process.

This translates into a solid scoring system for risk. Enterprise options to collect data for a scoring system are:

1- Vendor Security Alerts

2- Vulnerability Management Advisories (Usually security scanner, and IDS/IPS shops)

3- Vulnerability Intelligence Advisories (e.g. Secunia, iDefense, Deepsight)

4- Internal risk scoring systems (yes we all love academic endeavors - that is why PCI SSC asks for "outside" source : )

Either way (using one of the options, using some/all of them) PCI recommendation 6.2 will push risk management practices in the right direction and make risk prioritization a priority...Eventually PCI shops will (6/30/2012) integrate risk management with vulnerability scanning devices, security alerts, advisories and patch management solutions to audit and validate PCI 6.2 with risk rankings.

Here are a few good links:

Common Vulnerability Scoring System (CVSS-SIG) - http://www.first.org/cvss/

Common Vulnerabilities and Exposures -CVE - http://cve.mitre.org/

National Vulnerability Database - NVD - http://nvd.nist.gov/

Secunia - http://secunia.com/advisories/

Verisign iDefense - http://www.verisigninc.com/en_US/products-and-services/network-intelligence-availability/idefense/index.xhtml

TippingPoint Zero Day Initiative ZDI - http://www.zerodayinitiative.com/advisories/upcoming/

Symanted DeepSight Alert Services - https://tms.symantec.com/

Cisco Security IntelliShield Alert Manager Service -http://www.cisco.com/en/US/products/ps6834/serv_group_home.html

IBM ISS XForce - http://www-935.ibm.com/services/us/iss/xforce/

VUPEN - http://www.vupen.com/english/research.php

McAfee Threat Intelligence Services (MTIS) - http://www.mcafee.com/us/mcafee-labs/technology/threat-intelligence-services.aspx

Bugtraq -http://seclists.org/bugtraq/

Full Disclosure - http://seclists.org/fulldisclosure/

p.s. I have written this article for RSA Conference 

Video Notes From the RSA 2011 Conference

RSA Conference 2011

Video Blog #1
RSA Conference Video Blogger Yinal Ozkan talks about his first day at the 2011 RSA Conference in San Francisco, California.

http://www.youtube.com/rsaconference#p/u/99/88pVqQgjkH0 

Video Blog #2
http://www.youtube.com/rsaconference#p/u/96/Ss33IH0laAw

Video Blog #3
http://www.youtube.com/rsaconference#p/u/94/vUtFR_DeHOc

Talent Filtering for Information Security

I have written this article for RSA Conference blog originally (https://365.rsaconference.com/blogs/yinal-ozkan)

Great results are not achieved by mediocre teams… Building the right Information Security team does matter, and usually it becomes a full time task for the owners of Information Security initiatives at today’s enterprise.

Information Security domain might be hot, and we may have a positive influx of talent to the sector, however finding the right people with right skills sets at the right time and the right cost is close to impossible.

This post has no intention of questioning/changing years of HR practices – the goal is to give feedback from the enterprise Information Security field and to create useful short order cook content that can quickly be consumed within the next 15 minutes for the upcoming interview you are conducting…

Here are my experiences with finding/hiring talent in Information Security:

1-      Do not reinvent basics. As Buffet/Gates duo has stated the great talent should have the 3 basic skills:

• Technical Skills (This is standard – I will dig into this item more down below)
• Conceptual Thinking (Seeing the big picture)
• Communication Skills (This is not talking too much as perceived by many engineers. Effective communication is a very valuable skill in all team deliverables

It is usually simple to find any one of these skills in an individual, but when you find 3 of them together never miss the opportunity, these people will carry the workload of many!

2-      Have the right pyramid mix of talent in your team: Complex projects require good leaders who can set the target, coach others, lead by example and more important than all great leaders can take the team from A to B. Then you need good managers, who can plan, organize and delegate. It is usually a good practice to have managers who cut their teeth in project management and financial management offices. Last, but not least, the engineers (or consultants). Based on the size of the project, you must determine whether to go with specialists or generalists. This is a big decision point. The more specialists you have, the more integration glue (architects, project managers, program managers ) you need.

3-      Since generic HR topics are not my intention here, I will skip managerial skills and focus on finding the right technical resources. Project based deliverables do not require that much real-time information. Therefore, it does not make sense to filter candidates based on closed book random interview questions. My recommendation is to measure their knowledge so you may level them based on knowledge. This is management basics -  data to wisdom:

• Ask them questions starting with who?, when?, where?, what?? If you can get good answers that means your candidate has “information”. Your candidate is probably familiar with the topic.
• Ask them questions starting with “how?”. If you can get good answers that means your candidate has knowledge.This is a clear signal of experience.
• Ask them questions starting with “why?” If you can get good answers to “why” questions that means your candidate has the wisdom and the conceptual thinking skills that you are looking for.

4-      Specialists: Being a specialist does not create a rain check to omit basics of information security. I have met several consultants who were very familiar with compliance but did not understand the technical tools, or I have seen great application security people with zero understanding of network basics. The trend is to have good understanding of all domains where you excel in 1 or 2 of the domains as a specialist. Interviewing specialists should have 2 different class of questions to gauge:

• How much do they do they own their domain of specialization?
• How much do they understand about how other domains work?

5-      Generalists: I believe there are 2 types of generalists you can trust in Information Security:

• New Grads with no experience
• Project Managers, Auditors, and Managers (usually go well with the certificates like CISSP, CISM etc)
• If you are interviewing a candidate with over 3 years of Information Security experience with no particular specialty that is a big red flag.

6-      Send consultants the questions that you will ask in advance. This will eliminate the “it is not at the top of my head /it has been a while” excuse. Since you send the technical interview questions in advance you can ask any particular sub question. This asynchronous Q&A style is more close to real life. This way you can also ask really tough questions as well.

7-      Ask for a sanitized copy of deliverables from the past assignments. Good samples are good indicators of pitched skills. Obtaining samples are problematic especially in Information Security due to security and Intellectual Property concerns but checking is better than not checking.

8-      Classify Information Security resource types (this is subjective) Classification will help you to identify your candidates specialty, customize your questions and assess them more evenly. In today’s IS world, I see the following backgrounds We can dig into each area in separate articles. Here is the bird’s eye view for the 15m intro:

• Network Security Specialists: This is the most abundant resource.  Most of the resources have strong networking background and they do have operational and engineering know-how about common tools like firewalls, IDP, content security, OS hardening.  Ask for the enterprise know how instead of small shops, that is completely different skill-set. It usually makes sense to get “Security Operations” resources from this background since their operational background fits well with the SOC (Security Operation Centers)
• Vulnerability Testers:  This is another domain where you can find a lot of resources. (not necessarily the best ones) From network testing, to penetration testing, this area requires a lot of technical skills. Ask for methodologies, frameworks, references and sample deliverables in addition to basic checks. Network Vulnerabilities, Application Vulnerabilities, operational Vulnerabilities, and the Physical Vulnerabilities are different so make sure that you have the right skill sets.
• Single Domain Specialists: If your project is big enough you can acquire a domain specialist (e.g. SIEM) or a technology (e.g. RSA envision) specialist. Be sure to question other skills as discussed above. DLP, DRM, Virtualization Security,  Social Media, and Mobile Security-type of next generation projects usually require specialists so it makes sense to start with a consultant specialists to acquire the skills sets.
• Application Security Specialists: Securing SAP, Siebel, Oracle is a life time goal. It does require life time experience. Again the same rules with hiring specialists.
• Desktop Security: Understanding desktop security is different than all other security areas where the end users are non-IT users. Lately desktop security domain is crisscrossing a lot of other domains like NAC, 802.1x, VDI so be very careful to filter.
• Code Security: This is a hot domain, possible candidates interact with application security, vulnerability testing. It is not possible to understand code security in every development framework so an eclipse environment  expert cannot be very useful in the .NET environment
• Security Architects: Even if you see a lot of titles with Security Architect, the real ones are tough to come by, look for understanding of EA frameworks like TOGAF, Zachman etc. Also look for special frameworks like ISO 27001, CoBIT, and NIST. Generic frameworks like ITIL, 6 Sigma, and other compliance frameworks are important. In addition, look for perfect understanding of operations and the technology.
• Compliance Specialists: Audit background helps. Top 4 experience helps. Compliance has 2 important parts, meeting compliance and an accreditation. Make sure that you acquire the right internal resources to meet your compliance goals.  Instead of going with multiple security compliance specialists, it will make more sense to build an information security management program that can answer the common 80% requirements of all frameworks.

9-      Classify candidate backgrounds based on the verticals; it makes sense to find Information Security resources with vertical specialization. I find it amusing to mark “government” background as we start discussing topics with “cyber” word… So far I have seen the following backgrounds in the field. Based on your project’s requirements, different backgrounds provide different outcome.. You can find Information Security professionals with the following backgrounds

•   Enterprise
  • Financials
  • Healthcare
  • Manufacturing
  • Utility
  • High Tech
  • Media
  • Other
• Government
  • Federal
  • State
• Military
• SMB
• Consultancy
• Higher-Ed
• Service Provider
• New Grad
• Vendor
• Reseller
• Out of Sector

Wrap Up: Look for talent with specific skill-sets – To help you better identify the right skill sets, customize your questions based on experience background, vertical background and universal skills such as conceptual thinking.

RSA SecurID Breach Questions

Q: What was stolen from RSA? (based on Art Coviello's blog) and What is the current risk for SecurID users?

A: RSA says "..extracted information could potentially be used to reduce the effectiveness of a current two-factor authentication implementation..." This is boiling water and everybody is trying to reverse engineer this statement.. What does RSA mean by reduced effectiveness? Without the full disclosure, all interpretations will be semi fictional.. Information sources are limited when RSA is silent. A very important sign of  RSA's response is "RSA SecurID Authentication Engine Security Best Practices Guide" document which was published in March 17.

Here are the 2 interesting statements from the March 17 Guide:

1 - "RSA recommends a defense-in-depth approach for protecting token data stored in your environment. RSA strongly recommends that your storage systems encrypt the token data with a separate key in addition to the encryption provided by RSA SecurID Authentication Engine. Using two separate keys maximizes the protection of stored token data."

My interpretation: Do not trust RSA authentication server's built-in encryption, use yours.This means 3rd party who "extracted information from RSA"  has a good understanding of how RSA obscures token data on the authentication server...It is usually possible to access stored encryption keys since they have to be accessed for operation anyway. So if source code is lost, this may happen faster..Risk: You had to secure auth server anyway, now the risks are higher but this specific risk does not require you to replace every single token in the field until your own auth server is hacked.. And believe me when your authentication server is hacked you have other serious problems as well (BTW I'am not sure how auth server will work if I encrypt token data with my keys at file level)

2- "Never give the token serial number, PIN, tokencode, token, passcode or passwords to anyone."

My interpretation: Let's analyze this one in-depth.. When you use SecurID, you enter passcode as your  password. A passcode is made up 2 pieces on RSA, a pseudo-number (that is dynamically generated on the token a.k.a. tokencode) and your PIN.. 

The beauty of multi-factor dynamic password tokens is that if I know your PIN I still need the tokencode (so the token).. If I steal your token, I still need the PIN... No attacks are effective until you get token for that specific 60 seconds+PIN combo.(in theory ; )....  The scary part of the warning above is the "token serial number", a number on the back of the token usually used as a subfactor for  enrollment and password resets... Directly losing ""token serial number" shouldn't have mattered . if it did, it was not supposed to be imprinted on the back of the token..So the hypothetical risk is that the guys who extracted data from RSA can generate a tokencode from the serial number.. I do not think this is the possibility since that eliminates the whole idea for the need for the token seeds..Hopefully RSA token's private algos are not that simple (serial number generates the seed).  Same argument is valid for tokencodes.. If I have to hide my tokencode where is the advantage of using a dynamic code generator?

Back Image with Token Serial Number

I will keep covering this topic until  we have a conclusive answer.

MSSPs - Another one bites the dust - Dell acquires SecureWorks

So I had to update my chart for MSSP history ..Again..

SecureWorks no more (independent). As you all know, last Tuesday (Jan 4th) Dell made this announcement from Round Rock, Texas "Dell today announced it has signed a definitive agreement to acquire SecureWorks Inc"

Financial Analysts were puzzled with the "all-cash" move from Dell. How come a technology giant with $53 Billion in annual revenues, is making a scene with a small services company with $120M revenue?..

Before moving to possible reasoning, let's dig the deeper question: "How Much ?"... Terms were not disclosed but here are the facts:

• As of 2010 SecureWorks was completing all the necessary prep work for an IPO after the 2008 fiasco.

• So it is not very difficult to guess the game changer on SecureWorks side: Bags of cash….

• Dell paid 10x reveunue ($1.4B) for a mediocre virtualized storage company (EqualLogic), so why not paying 10x to a successful company with over 3000 qualified "services" buyer accounts? (for those who pull the calc, it makes $1.2 billion in cash, but of course this is a guess – it looks like the number is around 600M)

• Bean counters will need to factor in the cost of acquiring an acqusition mode startup company with plenty of debt when calculating SecureWorks' price tag.(SecureWorks acquired Lurqh, DNS, and Verisign -$45M- MSS lately - from 2004–2008. SecureWorks grew 492 percent)

• At the end of the day IBM paid $1.3B to ISS in 2006.



Why Dell Acquired SecureWorks?

CATALYST:

Security is the catalyst component in many large scale complex deals even if does not present a larger financial percentage of the whole deal. Lately information security is getting more and more byzantine and unmanageable,so selling security hardware/software/consulting does not quench today’s enterprise level security needs. So instead of acquiring half baked hardware/software solutions (like HP's TippingPoint, Arcsight or IBM’s Guardium, Ounce Labs, BigFix acquisitions) Dell made a shortcut to get the whole security package. SecureWorks can offer full security services with or without “best of breed hardware/software” , they do all they need is a “Dell” box loaded with a homemade software such as iSensor, iScanner etc/.

MSP + MSSP

Merging MSPs with MSSPs enable companies like Dell to offer complex services remotely. Outsourcing performed in the form of “body shop” is so 1990s. Taking over the operations of a large company and their IT staff is not outsourcing / neither sending the same operation to overseas. The leverage is where shared services are utilized .That is why Telecoms like Verizon, BT, AT&T and NTT are behind all “managed service” offerings. When compared with HP and IBM, Dell is much better positioned with their strategy. Please evaluate Everdream, Silverback, MessageOne, and KACE acquisitions of Dell. Dell has been making acquisitions to become the “Shared Services” central of the world. Dell is perfectly positioned to offer services remotely from Data Centers without the outsourcing shops like HP-EDS or IBM Global Services. Remote device management, or in Dell’s words “Distributed Device Management” is the next generation of outsourcing. With SecureWorks, Dell will add another critical piece to remote device management and in-the-cloud offerings : Security. (Dell also acquires Perot Systems to fill in the “services” gap) . With SecureWorks, Dell will acquire Verisign’s remote management platform and SecureWorks’ SIM-On-Demand hosted security solutions… Dell already owns in the cloud Message-One security systems..HP and IBM will need to build services around the security tools they have acquired.

POWER OF MARKETING

SecureWorks reached the first 1000 customers with a very small dedicated team from Atlanta, GA. Targeting small credit unions and healthcare organizations, SecureWorks now has around 3000 managed security services customers. Even if the revenue numbers are limited, Dell will be happy to leverage the SecureWorks’ know-how in acquiring “Monthly Recurring Revenue”.

COMPETITION

HP, Dell, Cisco and IBM are in a tight race to own enterprise data centers…Any leverage is welcome for Dell. Many of HP Enterprise Services (HPES - formerly known as EDS) customer shops are SecureWorks customers. Dell’s SecureWorks acquisition puts HP on a very uncomfortable seat. HP does not have an MSSP like IBM (EDS came with UK based Vistorm but try finding "managed security" on hp web sites today) , and they do not have the know-how for build and run an MSSP (where Verizon has Cybertrust, BT has Counterpane , NTT has Integralis, IBM has ISS etc).. it will be an interesting year to watch remaining managed/in-the-cloud security service providers: Perimeter, Fishnet, Trustwave, Solutionary and zScaler.

Outsourcing shops, and System Integrators (SI)s are puzzled with this as well. Other major players like Fujitsu, AT&T, Raytheon, Savvis, Unisys, T-Systems, Tata, CSC, Wipro, Logica and any other large scale Telecoms offer managed security (MSS) as a part of other offerings. Security heavy weights McAfee (now Intel) and Symantec have conflict of interest when offering vendor agnostic services.



What Does SecureWorks Offer Today?

Managed SERVICES

• SIM On-Demand – SaaS without 3rd party vendors

• Log Monitoring

• Log Retention

• IPS / IDS – via 3rd party CPE and internal appliances

• Firewall via 3rd party CPE and internal appliances

• Web App Firewall

• Host IPS

• Vulnerability Scanning via 3rd party CPE and internal appliances

• Web App Scanning via 3rd party CPE and internal appliances

• Encrypted Email

• Security and Risk Consulting

• Deployment Services

Compliance Solutions

• GLBA/FFIEC – financial services

• HIPAA - healthcare

• NERC CIP - utilities

• PCI – payment services

• FISMA –US government

Vertical Solutions

• Banking Compliance Solutions

• Credit Unions Compliance Solutions

• Utilities Compliance Solutions

• Healthcare Compliance Solutions

• Insurance Compliance Solutions

• Retail Compliance Solutions

• Government Compliance Solutions

Security Research

• Advisories

• Articles

• Counter Threat UnitSM

• Newsletter

• Research Blog

• Security Tools

• Security Threat Analyses

• Webcasts

• White Papers



SecureWorks VC investors

Mellon Ventures Inc., GE Capital, SBK Capital, Alliance Technology Ventures L.P., ITC Holding Co. Frontier Capital (via Lurhq) , Great Hill Partners, and Noro-Moseley Partners.







Recent Relevant Dell acquisitions

• Everdream Software 2007 - MSP - Remote Service Management

• ACS (not Xerox' ACS Inc) 2006 - Application Management

• SilverBack Technologies 2007, MSP - Platform Provider

• MessageOne 2008 - Security As a Service (Content Filtering)

• Perot Systems 2009 - SI

• KACE Networks 2010 - MSP Appliance

Recent Relevant IBM acquisitions

• Internet Security Systems (ISS), 2006 - MSSP

• Consul Risk Management, Inc., 2007 - Risk Management

• Watchfire Corporation, 2007 - Security Testing

• Ounce Labs 2009 - Code/Application Security

• Guardium 2010 - Database Security

• BigFix, Inc 2010 - Patch Management

• OpenPages 2010 - GRC

Recent Relevant HP acquisitions

• SPI Dynamics Inc., 2007 - Application Security Testing

• Opsware - 2007 Network management

• Atos Origin Middle East Group - SI

• Electronic Data Systems, 2008 - SI  (EDS acquired Vistorm)

• 3Com (includes TippingPoint), 2009 - Network and Security Infrastructure

• ArcSight, 2010 - Security Event and Information Management

• Fortify Software, 2010 - Code/Application Security