At first glance, the latest BlackTech firmware attack isn’t all the interesting as it’s a fairly run of the mill firmware / system-level attack, and that is mostly true. There are, however, a couple aspects worth digging into and discussing in more depth, specifically as they relate to larger system security and extrapolating these concerns to Linux-based systems.
Read MoreThroughout civilization, trust has been the glue that binds us together. Long before there were computers, there was trust. Without trust, relationships decay. Computers don’t change that. In fact, digital trust is every bit as important as personal trust. Digital trust means having confidence in the truth and reliability of the data.
Read MoreIn order to establish a security posture for our systems and ensure we’re enabling the right security protections, we need to clearly define what our threat model is. A threat model guides us in selecting appropriate system configurations and options, to determine if we have enough security in place, and to determine if that security protects from actors with the given level of access.
Read MoreMost security mechanisms in Linux are focused on protecting users while the system is powered on. This makes sense, since most computing happens while the computer is powered on, but there is an entire class of attacks that can occur while the system is off. Imagine an attacker removes the hard drive, makes changes to it, and replaces it. How can we detect and defend the operating system’s code against such an attack? The answer is by using a of file system integrity scheme. (The more general problem of preventing an attacker from changing user data or extracting secrets is a discussion for another time.)
Read MoreIn the infancy of computing, passwords relied heavily on trust. These early passwords were relatively short and simple. As the trust eroded and the threat model changed, we started to enforce restrictions around passwords such as minimum length and using encrypted passwords for system access. As computing continued to evolve, it became even easier to guess or manipulate passwords thereby driving more artificial complexity and, ultimately, user hate and non-compliance.
Let’s take a step back, evaluate some password threats, review their protections, and challenge evolving complexity requirements.
Read MoreIt's not fair.
When attacking an embedded system, it takes only one vulnerability to lead to an exploit.
This means, when tasked with securing an embedded system, the defender must think through and be prepared to protect against every possible vulnerability. Overlook just one opening and the attacker may find it, take control, steal your secrets, and create an exploit for others to use anytime, anywhere.
Worse yet, that same attacker may use an initial compromised device to pivot from one exploited subsystem to another, causing further damage to your network, mission, and reputation.
In this blog post, we present the Top 10 properties of highly-secure embedded systems – insight that is based upon decades of experience engineering security solutions across a number of high-value military and commercial platforms.
Read MoreWhile we don’t yet know all the details, the recent SolarWinds Orion compromise brings to light a key tenant of software distribution and secure systems; namely that signing software release packages in a secure fashion is absolutely paramount. But it also helps us realize there is no magic bullet for security, and defense-in-depth must be realized at all levels of the software development lifecycle.
Read MoreIn September of 2020, a team at the Systems and Network Security Group at VU Amsterdam announced a new technique for developing exploits they called BlindSide [1].
BlindSide allows an attacker to conduct Blind ROP-style [2] attacks against targets that are not crash-resistant, such as the Linux kernel. What does this mean for you as a system engineer? It means BlindSide can enable an attacker with knowledge of a single kernel overflow vulnerability to convert an unprivileged shell to a root shell despite recent kernel features designed to prevent information leaks which can lead to these types of privilege escalations.
It is techniques like BlindSide, and other techniques still unknown, that drive Star Lab to design its products with the assumption that an attacker will gain root access. It is why we advocate everyone at least consider…
Read MoreOn August 13th, 2020, The National Security Agency and Federal Bureau of Investigations released a cybersecurity advisory that warned anyone deploying or maintaining a Linux system about a new Russian (and now worldwide) cyber espionage threat named Drovorub. Of course, this isn't the first time a government-sponsored cyber threat has found its way into the wild. But its newsworthiness lies not in its origin, novelty, or effectiveness, but in the fact that it can be completely prevented to begin with.
Read MoreProtecting endpoints is hard. Understatement of the millennium, right?
Protecting unmanaged endpoints is even harder. Doubtful that surprises anyone.
Protecting mission-critical, unmanaged endpoints? Well, saying it's impossible is a stretch, but superlatives are warranted.
One of the most common goals in system security is maintaining system integrity. Knowing what is running (or can run) on the deployed system is critical, especially in embedded and unmanaged use cases.
Enterprise and managed endpoints are not immune from these concerns either.
The countless servers and devices that drive the modern world and economy require the same assurances; the difference being the enterprise world usually has more infrastructure and connectivity to achieve these goals.
If we roll back the clocks to early 2018, maintaining system integrity was already a…
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