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IP: Navy's Open Source Security Project Shines
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Date: Thu, 08 Oct 1998 23:28:13 -0400
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Subject: IP: Navy's Open Source Security Project Shines
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Navy's Open Source Security Project Shines
Oct 08, 1998 (Tech Web - CMP via COMTEX) -- An open source security
program created by a team of Navy programmers is proving to be one of
the most successful high-tech network burglar alarms online.
Late last month, the Navy released an unusual warning -- attackers were
probing military computers in ways that had previously gone unnoticed,
coordinating efforts around the world to keep any individual series of
probes virtually invisible.
Analysts had finally noticed the potential crackers' coordinated probes
using the Navy's SHADOW, or Secondary Heuristic Analysis System for
Defensive Online Warfare, intrusion-detection program.
"It was partly dumb luck," said Stephen Northcutt, the Navy's lead
analyst and programmer on the SHADOW team. But the software's
sensitivity to subtle attacks, combined with the number-crunching power
of statisticians associated with the project, let Northcutt and his
team of analysts tease evidence of the probes out of a mass of
apparently innocuous network logs, he said.
The SHADOW software is one of a growing number of intrusion-detection
tools on the market, designed to pick up and help analyze attempts to
break into computer networks instead of simply functioning as a passive
firewall-style siege wall.
Most of the major commercial-security vendors, such as Axent, Internet
Security Systems, or Network Associates, all provide
intrusion-detection programs, with support and service teams that can
help analyze possible attacks.
SHADOW is different in this respect. It is freely distributed online.
Like most open source programs, there is some documentation, but no
official support -- although there is a huge community of programmers
who have looked at the code and have written improvements and continue
to tinker with the way it functions.
The software itself is the product of more than two years of work by a
team led by Northcutt. The code was initially released to the public
last May, and revised later in the summer after a slew of comments and
criticism from outside developers.
It consists of two parts. Sensors sit outside a network firewall,
monitoring normal and potentially illicit attempts to enter the
network. An analysis system sits inside the firewall keeping a log of
activity, and periodically putting this information in front of a human
security analyst.
In the months since its release, the program has been picked up and
used by several major financial institutions, universities, local
government systems, and divisions of large companies that don't have
budgets for commercial intrusion-detection programs, Northcutt said.
"It's very good at doing some things and not so good at others," said
Allen Paller, chief researcher at the SANS Institute, a
network-security research and education organization. The program can
be initially difficult to use, since it requires users to program their
own filters to recognize attacks or probes not included in the original
documentation.
But the program's open source birth and evolution has made it strong
and extremely sensitive, Paller said. "The real strength of this
process is [the program] has been beaten on."
Northcutt is a proponent of pushing the open source model even beyond
the development of code, at least in the security field.
Most intrusion-detection programs function by picking up unusual events
-- malformed TCP or domain name system queries, handshakes between
servers and clients that don't look quite right, or other signs of
computer probes and attacks. SHADOW and other commercial trip-wire
programs do a good job of picking up things they recognize, Northcutt
and other security analysts said. But new attacks -- such as the
coordinated probes spotlighted by the Navy last month -- require
considerable expert analysis to spot.
"Attackers have been sharing very well inside their community," we have
no equivalent to the underground magazines and other communication
channels." -- Stephen Northcutt U.S. Navy That's where the open source
model comes in, Northcutt said. Intrusion-detection analysts can
function best if information about different attacks is widely and
freely distributed. The Navy site that distributes SHADOW publishes
much of the information it uncovers, and distributes new filters that
recognize new attacks and probes. This kind of open, widely shared
information is critical for stopping crackers, but must happen on a
wide scale, he said.
"Attackers have been sharing very well inside their community,"
Northcutt said. "We have no equivalent to the underground magazines and
other communication channels."
Paller agreed. His organization is one of several that sponsor
workshops where security professionals can share their experiences with
their peers. SANS also runs a security-oriented mailing list with
nearly 55,000 subscribers, many of whom served as SHADOW reviewers.
"Unless we get communication lines going, we can't keep up," Paller
said. "Otherwise, we don't have a chance."
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Copyright (C) 1998 CMP Media Inc.
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Robert A. Hettinga <mailto: [email protected]>
Philodox Financial Technology Evangelism <http://www.philodox.com/>
44 Farquhar Street, Boston, MA 02131 USA
"... however it may deserve respect for its usefulness and antiquity,
[predicting the end of the world] has not been found agreeable to
experience." -- Edward Gibbon, 'Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire'