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The topic says it all - I encountered the term in a PDF given to me. So ... what does the term/phrase 'War Dialing' mean?
After digging a little deeper into cryptography I am wondering what impact the different padding schemes do have an the security of an encryption algorithm. Lets take AES-128 in CBC mode as an example, because I am currently working with this one. Wikipedia lists several padding schemes but does not mention anything ab...
This is going to branch into a bunch of separate questions.....here is some background for the question: The Rijndael algorithm was crowned the new AES by Uncle Sam for sensitive, but unclassified info (128-256 key+block sizes through 10-14 rounds) . The Kerckhoff school of thought is "Let the algorithm be known, just ...
If I wrote RC5-32/12/16, it would mean 32-bit words (which is 64-bit data blocks). What is "words". I know the 12 is rounds and 16 is key size (16 bytes, so 128 bit).
I'm studying for the CISSP exam and one of the video lecture points didn't quite make sense to me. The instructor was discussing access control administration areas and began categorizing certain things as "preventative" and "detective". For example, data encryption: preventative... data integrity checks: detective.....
I got this sent by a friend on Facebook and I don't think its a genuine message: ___ shared a link on your Wall. This will leave you speechless) http://www.facebook.com/pages/Osama-Bin-Laden-Killed-Leaked-Video/185837861463668 Osama Bin Laden Death Video! Navy Seals raid Bin Ladens hideout and execute him! There...
Browsing through the site I encountered this Is there a way to negotiate a secret between 2 parties with no prior knowledge? What is an active attack then?
This quizrace.com quiz game is spreading like a virus all over internet forums and sites like 4cahn, minecraft etc (just google for it) - because it requires you to invite 3 friends to continue beyond question 6. I have to admit it's very appealing game - if you like puzzles and code cracking - but how safe it is? The...
How do the various SSH daemons that run on Windows compare in terms of security? Vulnerabilities found, reviews by respected reviewers, source code availability, etc. I only need access to a cmd shell. (updated to be less subjective)
In assigning budget rationally - ie proportionally to the risk in a particular area, how can you calculate the relative risks? I can think of examples where clients of mine have secured their websites very well, but have no security on their front door and no vetting of contractors - this seems crazy but usually boils ...
In The Linux Security Circus: On GUI isolation - The Invisible Things Lab's blog, Joanna Rutkowska describes attacks from one X11 app on another and the general problem of the lack of GUI-level isolation, and how it essentially nullifies all the desktop security. One application can sniff or inject keystrokes to anoth...
I have always enjoyed trying to gain access to things I'm not really supposed to play around with. I found Hack This Site a long time ago and I learned a lot from it. The issue I have with HTS is that they haven't updated their content in a very long time and the challenges are very similar. I'm no longer 13 and I want...
I know NIST called for contenders (in 2007) regarding the new hash algorithm to replace SHA-2. Has there been a selection, or finalists selected?
Does anyone know of a free and effective port monitor for mac? Also, can a laymen, in relatively short order, learn to use such software to detect and thus prevent unauthorized remote access/control of their system?
Is anyone familiar with an ISO standard outlining the hiring of labour for vendors being hired by DHS or Canadian government? I've found security standards but nothing for hiring practices. Edit for clarification. Our company will be selling to the public sector for city engineering and emergency services. Since we're ...
Today's switches are vulnerable to CAM Table attack? https://secure.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/wiki/CAM_Table
I got involved in a strange scenario today :-) . Some 'UDPAgent.exe' file/worm/virus was trying to access my collegue's system and the antivirum program was showing that this particular thing is coming from my ip though I had no idea aboutt he particular trojan/worm/virus. Any ideas/guesses/helps in identifying the iss...
What are the advantages and drawbacks of the certificate based authentication over username and password authentication? I know some, but I would appreciate a structured and detailed answer. UPDATE I am interested as well in knowing what attacks are they prone to, e.g. as so far mentioned brute force, while nothing is ...
what is a good public available iptables script for ddos mitigation?
I have some pcap files, and i would like just to get a list of protocols that are present on that pcap file. I would like it in a batch mode, not using wireshark I think tshark is able to do it, but i couldn't find how. any idea?
Is the Gmail activity log still missing activesync as described in this blog post? As it is "someone with my credentials could be reading and sending [email] messages with my account" without that access being reported via the log.
Raw SQL When you're writing SQL -- for anything that takes human input really, a lot of things have been done to avoid the injection. Everyone that's heard of SQL injection knows that (I'm going to use PHP as a sample) doing something like this isn't safe: $sql = "SELECT * FROM `users` . WHERE `userName` = "{$_POST["...
Note: One, I am not sure if synthetic queries is right word for the risk I am talking about. Second, though I am considering 3-tier model of web-applications general answers are welcome in client-server situations where server side validation is not possible. Currently I have a page where you do certain computations us...
Are there any defacto resources for understanding the basics of smart cards? My problem is that I don't know what I don't know about the technology. Any good primers?
I would like to try a Steganograghy program - know of one? How 'heavy' can it be: 1- Can I run the plaintext through a SHA-2 hash, THEN.... 2- Encrypt the digest with my private key (Digital Signature) and attach it to the plaintext, THEN... 3- Encrptyt the plaintext + encryped digest (symetrically) with AES, THEN........
If people could be fooled in life so easily ( http://www.bbc.co.uk/realhustle/ ) then in computing.... What are the best tips to persuade a regular user to pay a little more attention to security: e.g.: use HTTPS where available, up-to-date software, don't log in at a netcafe, don't click on links that you doesn't tru...
How to find out that a NIC is in promiscuous mode on a LAN?
I want to understand how certificates add to the security of information exchange. Suppose i have a encrypted bidirectional connection between Alice and Bob, using a public key/private key pair. As long as i confirm by secure channels that the public key actually belongs to the expected end of the tunnel, i have secure...
Many flash website whitelisting extensions for chrome (such as flashblock and flashcontrol) use javascript in order to selectively block Adobe Flash from functioning. Thus, In order to get this functionality, I have to enable javascript for the site resulting in a different kind of possible security vulnerability. Th...
They say algorithms like AES can't practically be broken given a long enough key length (> 128 bits). If I use GnuPG to encrypt a file using AES: gpg -c --cipher-algo AES secretfile it asks me for a passphrase. I understand that along with my passphrase, a salt and a key derivation function is used to generate a 128-bi...
This question concerns the session send and receive keys used in SSL/TLS protocol. my understanding is that this key uses symmetric encryption (DES, AES, BlowFish, etc.) I'm wondering, if public-private key pairs are superior to symmetric keys regarding key exchange security, why don't use asymmetric encryption for the...
Hey studying the SSL protocol, I'm wondering how can someone be able to do a replay attack if the server nonce is missing? All the material I find says that nonces prevent it, but theres no examples which specify why or how
I read the article on Wikipedia describing what a DMZ (demilitarized zone) is on a network, but am still failing to grasp both how it is set up (ie: is it within the main network or sequestered away?) and what its benefits and uses are. Can anyone explain to me why I'd like to have a DMZ on my network, given the follow...
When I open https://java.com my browser says “untrusted connection” but when I open https://www.java.com my browser says it’s ok. But it's the same site. So my question is: Is this a security bug? It's like having self-signed certs? Several domains struggle with correct HTTPS settings regarding having the "www" prefix ...
I recently noticed an SMTP session on my server which started when a remote host connected but never seemed to result in any emails being delivered. I could see that it was probably a SPAM site and so I killed the SMTP session, but the remote host immediately reconnected but using a different HELO domain. I was curious...
I've received a spam from one of my friends (well I'm sure he didn't send it). so there's this link, and i'd thought what exactly would be the implications of clicking the link (i've not clicked it yet)?
We have seen this attack method grow as part of Advanced Persistent Threats (operation Aurora against Google or the G20 French Finance ministry attacks come to mind) but I have no doubt that even smaller scale attacks may employ this methodology if there is a lot to gain. Our case is: high value individuals within the ...
suppose i've created VPN certificates for a certain VPN-RoadWarrior-Client, expressed in the files VPN-RoadWarrior-Client.key and VPN-RoadWarrior-Client.crt*, however VPN-RoadWarrior-Client is actually in Sweden most of the year, so i need a secure way to deliver these keys to them remotely without compromising the sec...
What are the main issues and recommended controls when exposing SIP and H.323 to the Internet (could be for voice, video, and instant messaging traffic or all three)? Specifically I'm looking for best practices in firewall/DMZ architecture, and any additional recommended security controls, when deploying SIP and H.323 ...
Most browsers offer to save the password after entering it on many logon pages. What types of vulnerabilities are there for such saved passwords. I'm interested in what ways malware on web pages that are accessed later might be able to retrieve the passwords (or make use of them). Are there vulnerabilities from thes...
I have a codebase that needs a code review to evaluate it for backdoors. The code is far too big to review it all, how would you recommend approaching the problem. It is a java web application with an oracle database, the code is customized from a product that is exceedingly large. The customizations cover almost all o...
Regarding: https://unix.stackexchange.com/questions/12924/ssh-tunnel-with-vnc Which one would be better, if we look it @security side? I heard that RDP is very very poor when it comes to security.
I am currently CompTIA A+, Network+, and Security+ certified. As part of maintaining compliance with the DoDD 8570, I will also be sitting for the ISC^2 CISSP exam in the near future. I have noticed that GIAC offers certifications with open-book exams that are regarded by DoDD 8570 as in equal standing to the CISSP. ...
Scenario: Someone is attacking your network. However, they're not exactly using their machine to do it - they're using a VM running on their system. The VM's network adapter is configured in "bridged mode" so that the VM gets its own IP address, and effectively functions on the network as a separate machine from the ...
The question of how to balance pragmatism with an absolutist view of security has been discussed here already. But I need the answer to a concrete variant of that question. You're the security expert hired to help an application team with the security problems of their app. One of the members of the team takes the "goo...
For the second time in a month, my work PC has been infected with malware that is hijacking my Google search results in Firefox. A search for the URL hijacked searches end up at turns up nothing on any sites I would deem reputable. The first time it happened our IT vendor installed Malwarebytes Anti-malware and that s...
Can someone explain, in plain English, the practical ways FHE and PHE can be leveraged in the cloud? Some interesting (and confusing) links include this Microsoft Research PDF and this Wikipedia entry. Questions: Is homomorphic encryption considered secure, from a cryptanalysis point of view? What operations can/can...
I tried this question on programmers site with no luck Do you see any reason to block a local html file from accessing another local files located in the same folder? I mean, if a user downloaded an html app (consisting of several html files) and opened it in her browser, why would she want to block this local app from...
Edit: Update - I am researching how to implement AES with authentication in an efficient way for this project. If you have the time I'd appreciate your skill in finding the best implementation for this FOSS project. Could you folks review and comment on the encryption code I just posted on Codeplex? The intent is to...
I use KeePass + Dropbox to manage and synchronize my passwords across my devices. This system works really great and I trust KeePass' security model. However my biggest remaining concern is the master password as I am worried about not being able to protect my PC against keyloggers. To alleviate this fear I want to int...
I understand how to use the Grid multi-factor authentication as a user but how does it work technically? Specifically how can just a few letters from the grid be enough to decrypt any secret defined ahead of time or is this a more traditional challenge-response type of model? EDIT: Link to Lastpass Grid Multifactor Au...
I'm studying for the CISSP exam and I'm getting confused about the differences between access control methods, security models, and security policies. When I was originally studying Mandatory Access Control, the video instructor seemed to closely tie it to Bell-Lapadula. After reviewing though, here's my new understa...
Recently my secondary e-mail address was exposed by an incident, and soon I received this spam. What is this spam used for?
After a lot of Google and forum searches, I found out CISSP is one of the few valuable certs. Unfortunately, I only have 2 years of experience and don't have any specific experience in security testing. Which should I pursue, CEH or GIAC? Are there any other good options for me?
Can anyone explain (or provide a link to a simple explanation) of what the Windows "Secure Desktop" mode is and how it works? I just heard about it in the KeePass documentation (KeePass - Enter Master Key on a Secure Desktop) and would like to understand it better.
I asked a question earlier where it was recommended that I describe my issue using standard cryptography notation. How do I learn this notation and how to convey my approach? How can I annotate this notation to indicate implementation specific issues? Although the wording of the second bullet may seem strange, I do n...
There was a recent XSS exploit on Facebook that posted a vulgar message and got users to click on a link to spread the payload. What vulnerability was exploited, and what can other sites do to avoid a similar attack?
What sorts of jobs are there, in which organizations, with what sorts of day-to-day responsibilities? What areas are good for folks coming out of school, vs what are good 2nd careers for experienced folks coming from various disciplines?
I'm studying the non-interference model as part of CISSP prep and am having trouble thinking of a practical example where a violation would be involved (and the consequences of those violations). I understand the mechanics of it -- the idea is to establish and maintain dividers between hierarchical levels to prevent a...
Context: I'm currently working as an expat for my company in a country where the Internet is notably untrustworthy. It made the headlines a few months ago for stealing facebook, twitter and gmail account passwords. There was a revolution back in January and things are supposed to have improved. And indeed they have...
I would like to export my private key from a Java Keytool keystore, so I can use it with openssl. How can I do that?
Could it be possible that a virus rewrites my BIOS with some malicious code? If so, how could I protect against it, or at least how can I check that the BIOS hasn't been modified?
There is a vulnerability where some applications (such as explorer.exe) respond to Unicode characters that change the direction of the text (right-to-left vs left-to-right). This may be used to mask an EXE file into one that looks like a text document. More information on this topic... What applications are vulnerable...
I am looking for an instant messaging / chat application which can be used securely across different platforms, eg Windows, Linux, BSD! Do any exist?
A wide range of products claim to offer "two-factor authentication" (c.v. Two-factor authentication - Wikipedia). Most are deployed as "something you have" to be used in addition to a normal password ("something you know"). Some of these "second factors" are as simple as providing a piece of paper with either one-tim...
I hear all this hype about Diaspora being decentralized, but the only information I can find on their official website and the Wikipedia article is that several people can run Diaspora servers. The main advantages of such decentralization are usually service availability and privacy. As to the latter asset, the risk I'...
I have a cap file in which I have lots of 802.11 packets encrypted with WEP key. The problem is lots of Chaff packets of WEP is included in that. I want to remove the Chaff packets and crack the key. Can anybody advise me of a tool or any method to remove the Chaff packets?
I'm looking for a fully open quantitative risk assessment methodology. Most of the methodologies have usage or licensing restrictions placed upon them. I define open as methodology covered by something equivalent to the Creative Commons CC BY or CC BY-SA licenses. I've looked ar FAIR, OCTAVE, CRAMM and a few others all...
A common statement start-up executives make regarding security is that they are in a race to market and if they consciously choose to build in security from the get-go it may slow them down so much as to take them out of the race. Hence they choose to do little to no security early on (or for several years) – acceptin...
John Doe told me the following story: I got a mail from a good friend. It just contained a single link. That seemed odd but I didn't think a lot about it. After clicking on the link, the web site of a company in my area of work opened. It didn't seem terribly interesting, so I closed it. A few days later, I started t...
I've recently read Google Chrome: The End of Drive-By Downloads. Is it true to say that drive-by-downloads are history in Google Chrome? So if I have a link (from a spam email) I can right-click >> open in new incognito window >> and be 100% sure that there is no virus / damage to my system? Initially i've asked this q...
Just wondering if it is possible to create a file which has its md5sum inside it along with other contents too.
If I'm visiting (just a desktop PC, client side) a site that has a valid HTTPS cert/connection, that can it be compromised if I'm using a rogue DNS server (not deliberately, I'm concerned about an attack on the DNS service)? I'm thinking about e.g.: the CA's site (to check the HTTPS connection) is resolved by my namese...
Sandboxie: http://www.sandboxie.com Does sandboxie "grab" all the system calls, e.g.: filesystem calls? Or it "grabs" all the low level calls from a process?
Scenario: Acme Corp. needs to collect evidence to support their side of a case in court. Part of this evidence may include e-mail messages. Certain employees who do not have administrative access to the e-mail server, but may have administrative access to their workstations, might have motive to alter this evidence....
as a follow-up to this question Can you get virus just by visiting a website in Chrome?, I've read these pages: http://www.straightsectalk.com/?p=47 http://www.vupen.com/demos/VUPEN_Pwning_Chrome.php http://dev.chromium.org/developers/design-documents/sandbox And I want to know that if I'm using the latest version o...
Using a public/private key pair is fairly convenient for logging in to frequented hosts, but if I'm using a key pair with no password, is that any safer (or less safe) than a password? The security around my private key file is paramount, but say my magical private key file was just a list of passwords to various host...
There is a new Javascript injection technique that is generating chatter on the forums mentioned here Here is the code sample: String.prototype.code = function(){ return (new Function('with(this) { return ' + this + '}' )).call({}); }; var s = 'alert("hello!");' s.code(); What infrastructure components need to be upda...
It appears that only Partial Homomorphic Encryption(P.H.E.) is practical for modern day (2011) use. However I'm having difficulty locating libraries (FOSS or otherwise) that enable me to leverage this technology. El Gamal is an example of an algorithm that does PHE, but the wiki page doesn't clearly explain what blind...
Are there any significant differences in the rights, privileges, permissions, or other powers held by the built-in Administrator account, and those held by non-built-in Administrator accounts?
I'm in the process of making changes to my site so that we can be a SAML 2.0 Service Provider. We will be doing IdP initiated SAML with Out-of-Band account federation. My question is this: Given a SAML response that is posted to the target page on my site, how do I verify that the response was generated by a trusted ...
When using Windows IPSec for IP filtering whenever a filter is added you need to have a "mirror" rule (by checking the "Mirrored. Match packets..." tickbox). Because IPSec Filtering is not stateful, if you don't have this option enabled then you can't communicate in both directions. From this article, I quote: If you ...
I'm currently studying for the CISSP exam and would like to ensure that I'm using proper terminology when referring to models. I'm a little confused because I'm coming across generic and specific labels; all of which seem to be referred to as "models". For example, there are terms like Information Flow, State Machin...
This is with regards* to Stack Exchange's upcoming OpenID provider (and in particular, discussion about password requirements). Currently, password requirements are: Must contain 3 of: lower case character, upper case character, number, special character**. Cannot contain any public account field. Must have at least 8...
My syslog indicates that someone plugged an iPhone USB device into my desktop at 4am today, for about 10 minutes. I'm checking physical security logs to see if there was someone in the room, but in the meantime I'm trying to investigate whether these symptoms could indicate some other kind of intrusion. I hope not......
To defend versus Remote File Inclusion where attackers try to abuse image files, I usually recommend to never use include to include image files into PHP code. Sometimes though, the avoidance of image includes may be not possible at all (for whatever reasons, doesn't matter). In such case I usually pickup the images so...
For instance, lets look at a common login system for a website HTTPS connection is made User submits credentials via POST Server-side code hashes the password and looks if it matches the user name Session is initialized, and a key may be issued to log in again without passwords ("remember me") This is generally the s...
Lets say I want to create a cookie for a user. Would simply generating a 1024 bit string by using /dev/urandom, and checking if it already exists (looping until I get a unique one) suffice? Should I be generating the key based on something else? Is this prone to an exploit somehow?
As an exercise, please consider the following: If you are faced with having to deploy off-the-shelf web applications that you are unsure about the vendors security coding practices, which techniques or technologies would be worthwhile applying or deploying for some protection? Assuming the following: You don't have ac...
Does someone know of a good example of a SQL Injection vulnerability that isn't in a web application? What is the user input for this attack? I am looking for a real vulnerability, not speculation. The following picture is an example of a speculated attack against license plate reading cameras: And of course there is ...
Phishing is a very serious problem that we face. Popular banks are often the biggest targets. What methods can a bank website use to protect its self from phishing attacks? What security systems should someone use to protect themselves? Why do these methods work?
I am concerned about keyloggers being installed on my system and transmitting sensitive data out of our network. Is there a common method that such malware uses to send its collection back to the hacker? For instance, do they generally contact a server directly and separately, or utilize an existing connection through ...
I heard that Fedora 15 will not use suid bits. Is that true? Is the suid bit a security design bug?
I'm looking to make a MySQL database on a VPS, accessible to my home PC through cPanel. cPanel wants the domain name or IP address of the remote machine. However, with standard DSL, I have a dynamic IP address. Now, according to the docs, I can use a wildcard in the IP, so I could use 123.45.67.% as my authorized remo...
I'm curious if anyone has any advice or points of reference when it comes to determining how many iterations is 'good enough' when using PBKDF2 (specifically with SHA-256). Certainly, 'good enough' is subjective and hard to define, varies by application & risk profile, and what's 'good enough' today is likely not 'good...
Why the government (and the DARPA in particular)is spending all these millions to improve the homomorphic encryption?which useful usage could it get?
Has anyone had experience with or is aware of any products that hash the OS kernel? This would be used, ideally, for watching for system compromises, auditing, change management, etc. I am looking for products, either open source or commercial, that have this capability. If such a product does not exist, does anyone...
There's a lot of VPN providers out there. Some are free, some are for a fee, some report logs to the government, some inject ads into your HTTP, some are in other countries, you might not have any real promise of security when using these services. How do you go about shopping for a VPN provider that won't just sell or...
if I logon with OpenID into a website (crafted by attackers/hackers) I want to know how much damage can they do to me? Are they able to steal my contact info, name, etc (assuming I'm using Gmail OpenId)
I'm a pretty decent (IMO) web app penetration tester, but I'm eager to expand my knowledge of other areas of security. Given that I've just taken on something of an enhanced sysadmin role at my work, I figured it would be a pretty good opportunity to try to learn more about network and operating system security. In ge...

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