February 2012 - Mark Ciampa's Blog (Security+ 4ed)

Much attention has been focused on a research paper that claims RSA encryption keys are weak. However, further analysis indicates that the number of weak keys is small, that it's limited to embedded network devices, that it does not affect digital certificates, and it's all due to improper implementation and not to weaknesses in the cryptography algorithm itself. The asymmetric algorithm RSA {Chapter 11 Security+ 4ed} was published in 1977 and patented by MIT in 1983. The RSA algorithm is the most common asymmetric cryptography algorithm and is the basis for several products. The RSA algorithm begins with a random number generator creating two large prime numbers (a prime number is a number divisible only by itself and 1), which is then followed by several additional steps. A paper was published two weeks ago (Feb 14 2011) that examined over 7 RSA million keys. The researchers found that 27,000 (or 0.03%) of them were improperly generated and offered “no security at all”...

For several years now there has been talk that Internet Service Providers (ISPs) should protect their subscribers by monitoring their computers for suspicious network behavior and then take action. An example would be when a subscriber's computer has been turned into a zombie {Chapter 2 Security+ 4ed} and is sending out massive amounts of spam the ISP could quarantine the computer. The customer could be identified by the ISP and made aware of a potential problem (see Oct 18 2010 blog posting). Yesterday (Feb 22 2012) the chairman of the U.S. Federal Communications Commission (FCC) said again that the ISPs need to protect us. The chairman called on ISPs to monitor their subscribers to identify those whose computers are part of a botnet. He also called on the ISPs to develop a code of conduct to combat botnets, to adopt secure routing standards to protect against Internet Protocol hijacking and to implement DNSSEC {Chapter 7 Security+ 4ed}. These were all priorities recently identified...

Recently a colleague forwarded to me an e-mail she received through Facebook: From: Mark Zuckerberg [mailto:tlelejkomxck@hotmail.com] Subject: Attention Facebook User Hi Friend, My name is Mark Zuckerberg, Ceo of Facebook. We have recently partnered up with Apple mackintosh regarding a one-time promotional event today, we are giving away complimentary Apple iPhones and iPads to randomly selected individuals who have been fortunate to be picked as one of our most recent winners for today. We randomly selected users from our systems database and you have matched with our latest drawing. We have partnered up with Apple to advertise their most popular product yet, the Apple iPhone and iPad. Once yet again, we are operating this promotion for one-day only. All you need to do is CLICK HERE to check out our site made for this promotion and fill out this short survey to recieve yours for free. Simply make sure you enter your email so we may locate our records to make certain that we have reserved...

A digital certificate {Chapter 12 Security+ 4ed} is a technology used to associate a user’s identity to a cryptographic public key, in which the user’s public key that has been “digitally signed” by a trusted third party. This third party verifies the owner and that the public key belongs to that owner. Microsoft's Internet Explorer 9 (IE9) Application Reputation now checks files to be downloaded against a Microsoft service that tries to identify the file's contents and its digital certificate. The most common transport encryption algorithm used for digital certificates is Secure Sockets Layer (SSL), which uses a public key to encrypt data that is transferred over the SSL connection. Transport Layer Security (TLS) is a protocol that guarantees privacy and data integrity between applications communicating over the Internet. TLS is an extension of SSL, and they are often referred to as SSL/TLS. The management tools for the use of digital certificates and asymmetric...

Why should you keep your wireless network secure? There are several reasons: to prevent snoopers from getting into any folder set with file sharing enabled. To deny attackers from seeing everything you're doing online by reading your wireless transmissions. To stop someone from accessing your network behind the firewall so they can inject malware. These and others are excellent reasons to keep your wireless network {Chapter 8 Security+ 4ed}. Now there may be one more reason to add to the list: to keep from being held liable for what an unauthorized user does. A federal lawsuit was recently filed in Massachusetts by a producer of videos. The producer has accused over 50 people in Massachusetts of using BitTorrent {Chapter 14 Security+ 4ed} to illegally download and share a movie. The illegal downloads were traced to IP addresses belonging to both named individuals and to several unknown persons ("John Does"). The complaint alleges that each of the defendants was directly responsible...