IDS mailing list archives
RE: FW: Honeytokens and detection
From: "Pete Herzog" <lists () isecom org>
Date: Sun, 27 Apr 2003 21:40:34 +0200
Hi, Sure if the honeytoken was to be used for internal policy enforcement it should absolutely be on the secretive side of things. However, I am still unclear about why ALL the tokens must be a secret to work for Internet collaborative enforcement? What if they were public but rotated every month with new ones? Would we be weeding out a good number of bad eggs who are up to no good and the few really clever ones who cross all their t's and dot their i's will be moving stuff with SCP and therefore not necessarily within our target anyways? So if all the major (A)DSL and Cable Modem providers used an IDS to drop and log any data stream containing the signature from one of 50 or even 500 honeytokens and they shared this signature with each other and a consortium of other network owners, changing the sigs and honeytokens every month, wouldn't this be beneficial for enhancing policy management? Again, I know it's not a simple task to set up and get people to sign up but the technology and capability is there now. As Frank Knobbe says, this is where intrusion detection blurs with forensics. It's a really interesting concept. Sincerely, -pete. Pete Herzog Managing Director Institute for Security and Open Methodologies www.isecom.org www.osstmm.org ISECOM is the OSSTMM Professional Security Tester (OPST) and OSSTMM Professional Security Analyst (OPSA) certification authority. Certifying professional, practial, and efficient security testing and analysis.
-----Original Message----- From: Jimi Thompson [mailto:jimit () myrealbox com] Sent: Saturday, April 26, 2003 1:58 AM To: lists () isecom org; FOCUS-IDS () securityfocus com Subject: Re: FW: Honeytokens and detection My experience with most "security incidents" is that they are insiders - either disgruntled current employees or ex-employees who are targeting a specific system or piece of information. Stastically speaking this is fairly standard. The email about the executive bonuses at American Airlines pops immediately to mind. Other examples are the employee who just wants to trash the database/email system/hr application server/phone system because they are angry. The moral of the story is that you have to trust who you hire even when you have to fire them. Your honeytokens are going to do a bit of good in those circumstances. They aren't going to go after an account of someone they've never heard of (i.e. your honeytoken). They are going to try to crack the HR VP's/CEO/other person they know's account that will have the rights to the thing they want or want to destroy. While external intrusions to run a very close second to "inside jobs", inside jobs still have the lead. Should you stop using them? No, but you should be aware of their limitations. About the sharing thing - the more people who know about it, the less likely it is to remain a secret. Secrecy and the number of people who know are inversely proportional. By the time you have replicated this out to your top 3 suppliers and the have replicated it out to their top 3 suppliers, you may as well have released it on the Internet. At 7:02 PM +0200 4/24/03, Pete Herzog wrote:Sorry for the delay; I thought about this for a while. While it may be necessary to use internally generated honeytokens to keep them extra secret (TM) what if these were updated every sooften? What ifthey were changed and distributed through a trusted network (partners who share policy on what to do if the token shows up on their radarscreen) withsay common IDS sigs in both compressed and standard forms? Whatif after 3months, these sigs were then released in the wild for anyone toupdate andhelp track (an expanded partner network). I see the use here for both the common ones (like the eicar testscript forAV) and home spun ones. Even some who "call home" somehow. Aheterogeneousmix would ensure viability of the honeytokens but only largecollaborationwould make it worthwhile to use over the Internet. Of course I also see tremendous privacy violation possibilities in this technology. Doubleclick meets Honeytoken meets RIAA meets DMCAanyone? Onering to bind them.... Scary stuff. I'd rather we begincollaborative workon this first and expand the knowledge and use as we come toterms with theethics. Sincerely, -pete. Pete Herzog Managing Director ISECOM www.isecom.org www.osstmm.org -----Original Message----- From: AQBARROS () BKB com br [mailto:AQBARROS () BKB com br] Sent: Tuesday, April 15, 2003 7:29 PM To: fknobbe () knobbeits com; lists () isecom org Cc: david () zbonski com; lance () honeynet org; FOCUS-IDS () securityfocus com Subject: RES: Honeytokens and detection I think that we cannot forget that honeytokens were already herefor a longtime, and that they aren't the final solution for tracking malicious activity. They are just one more tool. A tool that has seriouslimitationswhen we deal with encryption and compression. As for the fake administrator, you can use it as a real validuser, with arandom password with maximum size. Whenever you detect someonetrying to useit (you can do it detecting the traffic or watching logs), thealarm rings.I see honeytokens, as well as honeypots, being used as part of aintrusiondetection and prevention strategy. It's wise to not overestimate its possibilities. Regards, Augusto. -----Mensagem original----- De: Frank Knobbe [mailto:fknobbe () knobbeits com] Enviada em: segunda-feira, 14 de abril de 2003 0:07 Para: lists () isecom org Cc: david () zbonski com; lance () honeynet org; FOCUS-IDS () securityfocus com Assunto: RE: Honeytokens and detection On Tue, 2003-04-08 at 15:57, Pete Herzog wrote: > I disagree. I think you may not get the illustration infull. If thebogusCCs or ID numbers were known and padded into excel sheets,particular DBs,etc., especially those with thousands of numbers, the thief would be downloading the whole thing at once. It would not be aboutdownloadingonlypart of the DB or part of an Excel sheet as long as the dangerous onesdon'tget downloaded. Since it's downloaded in bulk, the IDS will look for thattoken somewhereinthe download (or upload). [...]Pete, I almost agreed with you, but then I started to think about some scenarios. a) Someone breaks into the database server. He pokes around and looks at a few records (most likely unencrypted). b) Someone breaks into the database server. Since the database is very large, he only samples the top 100 rows of data so he can retrieve a few numbers to buy himself a new watchamacallit. It's debatable if he could choose to encrypt the transfer, although chances are better. c) Someone breaks into the database server. Circumstances (size, bandwidth, time) are favorable to download the whole database. If the attacker does not encrypt the transfer, he would most likely compress the data. So, if data is bulk harvested, partially or in full, both encryption and compression would render the honeytokens useless. Casual snooping would have a higher probability to occur in clear text, but less of a chance to hit a honey token. I'm wondering how useful the honeytokens really are for a) professional thieves (encryption) and b) large datasets (high miss/hit ratio). Note that we are only talking about detection of data in transit, not of detection of data in use (as would be the case with copy-bugs etc.... you know, those intentional typos in documents to mark them). Augusto's reference to the fake administrator/root account would probably fall into the 'detect on use' category, not into the 'detect in transit' category. (i.e. administrator account in network packet) Perhaps we need to define classification structure of honeytokens. Your thoughts? Regards, Frank Esta mensagem, incluindo seus anexos, pode conter informação confidencial e/ou privilegiada. Se você recebeu este e-mail por engano, não utilize, copie ou divulgue as informações nele contidas. E, por favor, avise imediatamente o remetente, respondendo ao e-mail, e em seguida apague-o. Este e-mail possui conteúdo informativo e não transacional. Casonecessitede atendimento imediato, recomendamos utilizar um dos canais disponíveis: Internet Banking , BankBoston por telefone ou agência/representante de atendimento de sua conveniência. Agradecemos sua colaboração. This message, including its attachments, may contain confidential and/or privileged information. If you received this email by mistake,do not use,copy or disseminate any information herein contained. Please notify us immediately by replying to the sender and then delete it. Thisemail is forinformation purposes only, not for transactions. In case youneed immediateassistance, please use one of the following channels: Internet Banking , BankBoston by phone or branch/relationship manager at your convenience. Thank you for your cooperation. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------INTRUSION PREVENTION: READY FOR PRIME TIME? IntruShield now offers unprecedented Intrusion IntelligenceTMcapabilities -including intrusion identification, relevancy, direction, impact and analysis - enabling a path to prevention. Download the latest white paper "Intrusion Prevention: Myths, Challenges, and Requirements" at: http://www.securityfocus.com/IntruVert-focus-ids-- Thanks, Ms. Jimi Thompson, CISSP, Rev. "I'm a great believer in luck, and I find the harder I work, the more I have of it." -- Thomas Jefferson
------------------------------------------------------------------------------ INTRUSION PREVENTION: READY FOR PRIME TIME? IntruShield now offers unprecedented Intrusion IntelligenceTM capabilities - including intrusion identification, relevancy, direction, impact and analysis - enabling a path to prevention. Download the latest white paper "Intrusion Prevention: Myths, Challenges, and Requirements" at: http://www.securityfocus.com/IntruVert-focus-ids
Current thread:
- Honeytokens and detection Lance Spitzner (Apr 03)
- Re: Honeytokens and detection Michael Sierchio (Apr 03)
- <Possible follow-ups>
- RE: Honeytokens and detection Grant, Liam (Apr 04)
- Re: Honeytokens and detection David Zbonski (Apr 07)
- RE: Honeytokens and detection Pete Herzog (Apr 11)
- RE: Honeytokens and detection Frank Knobbe (Apr 14)
- RE: Honeytokens and detection Pete Herzog (Apr 11)
- FW: Honeytokens and detection Pete Herzog (Apr 24)
- RE: FW: Honeytokens and detection Pete Herzog (Apr 28)