Cyber Threat Dr. John P. Abraham Professor University of Texas Pan American

Intelligence threat  Why it is difficult to implement security and counter intelligence Open nature of our society Technology and information is easily obtained People travel with ease  Both friends of the country and foes are looking to gain economic edge Seek technological, financial & commercial information Target political, economic, military and scientific information.

Exporting Technology  there is concern that too much high technology is being freely traded around the world, too easily.  Source: Remarks of Assistant Secretary Christopher Padilla Computer & Communications Industry Association  The United States sees more organized efforts to obtain and illegally export controlled U.S. technology to China than to any other country.

Threats to homeland  National infrastructure is vulnerable Physical threat Computer attack  Infrastructure is interdependent Attack against one sector would impact other sectors  Example – attack against electric grid  Coordinated attack against selected critical nodes

Is there Security Threat in Outsourcing?  Outsourcing Reduces cost – tremendous savings to corp. Eliminates American jobs  Is development of software outside the country threat to national security? Yes it could. Scripts (malicious code) can be placed inside a program. On the other hand, it could be argued, Microsoft can place malicious code to spy on other countries. It is not good business practice to do so.

Can hardware be used to spy?  Yes. Computers contain chips that contain programs.  Malware can be programmed into these chips.  Can we trust computers manufactured outside USA? Capitalism is motivated by profits. While corporations do cooperate with governments, it does not make sense to jeopardize own business.

Present major concern  Attacks by foreign hackers (increasingly from China) Sabotaging networks Opening secret back doors for spying Source:( ntent/nov2006/tc _ htm?chan=top+ news_top+news+index_businessweek+exclusives)

How Hackers gain access  Directly Leaving computers accessible in your home or office. Theft of computer Shoulder surfing  Indirectly Through Internet connection  Open ports (USB, serial etc are physical ports, but they use logical ports assigned to the IP address)  Example: port 80 for HTTP, port 25, etc. 

Information Security as developed by the National Security Telecommunication and Information Systems Security Committee  Protection of: Information Hardware that store information Hardware that transmit information  From direct and indirect attacks  Without affecting availability to authorized users

Deliberate Security Threat  Espionage (national security)  Industrial Espionage Competitive intelligence (could be legal) Shoulder surfing Hacking  Sabotage (ex.denial of service by zombies)  Vandalism  Theft

Some techniques  Port scanning – enter through an open port  Password crack (brute force or dictionary)  Software scanning (what software is run)  Write scripts that can be used by software (malware)  Back doors (system passwords not changed)  Get access to a site and go from there to a trusted site  Man in the middle

Protection  Take all precautions  Also have backup plans (contingency plan) Off site systems Disaster recovery

How can we protect our computers  Recognize that “your” computer is being targeted.  University computers are “doors” to more secure sites. “Open proxy servers are used by spammers to send unwanted s. Proxy servers can also be abused for bypassing access restrictions and limitations such as in case of users in one country not allowed to access a website in another country can go through a third country’s proxy server. There are websites dedicated to provide and hourly updated list of free anonymous proxy server sites.” Abraham, John. “A Proxy Server for Mirrored Sites.”, ASEE 2007

Information Security as developed by the National Security Telecommunication and Information Systems Security Committee  Protection of: Information Hardware that store information Hardware that transmit information  From direct and indirect attacks  Without affecting availability to authorized users

Computer Security step1.  Firewalls Prevents a specific type of information from moving between the outside world (untrusted network) and the inside world (trusted). Packet filtering – every packet header is examined for address, packet type and port request. Dynamic packet filtering. Allows only a particular packet with a particular source, destination and port address to enter through the firewall.

Computer Security step2.  Application firewall (proxy server).  An intermediary between a client and a server Proxy server intercepts all requests to a server routed through it. Keeps the user from interacting directly with the server.  Ref: Abraham, John. “A Proxy Server for Mirrored Sites.”, ASEE 2007.

Computer Security step3  Intrusion detection systems (IDS) Like a burglar alarm. Works by examining network traffic. Performs protocol analysis, content searching/matching, and is commonly used to actively block or passively detect a variety of attacks and probes, such as buffer overflows and port scans. Can detect if attack has occurred and if the attack was successful. This information is ed to the administrator.

Computer Security step4. Network Address Translation  A computer needs a public IP address to attach to a public network.  Private IP addresses are not visible from the outside world.  It makes sense to use only private IP to secure your computer.  When outside communication is needed the private IP is mapped to public IP address using a port number. DHCP – not as good as NAT

Computer Security step5.  Encrypt transmissions The word cryptography in Greek means “secret writing.” The term today refers to the science and art of transforming messages to make them secure and immune to attacks.

Encryption contd.

Encryption Cont.  One secret key is used by both - known as symmetric encryption. (example DES)  Both sender and receiver must know the key.  Challenge is to send the key to the receiver. Must be send over another channel.  Two keys – public and private. Also known as Asymmetric encryption. Public key is stored in a public location, anyone can use it. Use public key to encrypt and private to decrypt. If Alice uses bob’s public key to encrypt, only bob with his private key can decrypt.

Encryption Cont. Public Key.

Encryption cont. Non-repudiation  When a digital signature is encrypted using a private key – it can be read by anyone with a public key. But the message was sent by only one who has the private key.  Digital certificates are used to authenticate the source of a file.

Computer Security step6  Install Current Version of Antivirus software. Virus - A small program that attaches to another program and replicates itself onto other programs. This activity itself slows down the computer. The virus may do annoying activities, damaging activities or information theft. Anti-virus programs are always trailing actual virus.

Computer Security Step7  Apply all latest operating system patches.  Malware exploits weakness in OS.  OS developers fix these holes as they become aware of it.

Computer Security Step8  Assign complex passwords to your computer. Avoid dictionary words.  Use different passwords for different accounts you have.  Assign passwords for your user files and turn on encryption.

Computer Security Step9  Assign CMOS password  /Computer-Hard-Drive-Search /Computer-Hard-Drive-Search

Computer Security Step10  Have a disaster recovery plan including backups.