CS9224 - INFORMATION SECURITY -UNIT II

Subject Name: CS9224 - INFORMATION SECURITY
Unit - 2

1. What are the four important functions, the information security performs in an organization?
Information security performs four important functions for an organization:
Protects the organization's ability to function
Enables the safe operation of applications implemented on the organization's IT systems
Protects the data the organization collects and uses
Safeguards the technology assets in use at the organization

2. What are threats?
A threat is an object, person, or other entity that represents a constant danger to an asset
Management must be informed of the various kinds of threats facing the organization
By examining each threat category in turn, management effectively protects its information through policy, education and training, and technology controls

3. What are different acts of Human error or failure?
Includes acts done without malicious intent. It is Caused by:
Inexperience
Improper training
Incorrect assumptions
Other circumstances

4. How human error can be prevented?
Much human error or failure can be prevented with training and ongoing awareness activities,but also with controls,ranging from simple procedures like asking users to type a critical command twice,to more complex procedures ,such as the verification of the commands by a second party(Eg key recovery actions in PKI systems)

5. What is Intellectual property?
Intellectual property is "the ownership of ideas and control over the tangible or virtual representation of those ideas" . Many organizations are in business to create intellectual property
trade secrets
copyrights
trademarks
patents

6. How Intellectual property can be protected?
Enforcement of copyright has been attempted with technical security mechanisms,such as using digital watermarks and embedded code.The most common reminder of the individual's obligation to fair and responsible use is the license agreement window that usually pops up during the installation of a new software.

7. What is deliberate acts of espionage or trespass?
Broad category of activities that breach confidentiality
Unauthorized accessing of information
Competitive intelligence vs. espionage
Shoulder surfing can occur any place a person is accessing confidential information
Controls implemented to mark the boundaries of an organization's virtual territory giving notice to trespassers that they are encroaching on the organization's cyberspace
Hackers uses skill, guile, or fraud to steal the property of someone else

8. Who are Hackers? What are the two hacker levels?
The classic perpetrator of deliberate acts of espionage or trespass is the hacker. Hackers are "people who use and create computer software [to] gain access to information illegally". Generally two skill levels among hackers: Expert hacker unskilled hacker(Script kiddies)

9.  What is information extortion?
Information extortion is an attacker or formerly trusted insider stealing information from a computer system and demanding compensation for its return or non-use
Extortion found in credit card number theft(A Russian hacker named Maxus,who hacked the online vendor and stole several hundred thousand credit card numbers).

10. What is deliberate acts of sabotage and vandalism?
Individual or group who want to deliberately sabotage the operations of a computer system or business, or perform acts of vandalism to either destroy an asset or damage the image of the organization
These threats can range from petty vandalism to organized sabotage
Organizations rely on image so Web defacing can lead to dropping consumer confidence and sales
Rising threat of hacktivist or cyber-activist operations - the most extreme version is cyber-terrorism

11. What is Cyber terrorism?
Cyberterrorism is amost sinister form of hacking involving cyberterrorists hacking systems to conduct terrorist activities through network or internet pathways.
An example was defacement of NATO web pages during the war in Kosovo.

12. What are the deliberate acts of theft?
Illegal taking of another's property - physical, electronic, or intellectual
The value of information suffers when it is copied and taken away without the owner's knowledge
Physical theft can be controlled - a wide variety of measures used from locked doors to guards or alarm systems
Electronic theft is a more complex problem to manage and control - organizations may not even know it has occurred

13. What are deliberate software attacks?
When an individual or group designs software to attack systems, they create malicious code/software called malware
Designed to damage, destroy, or deny service to the target systems
Includes:
macro virus
boot virus
worms
Trojan horses
logic bombs
back door or trap door
denial-of-service attacks
polymorphic
hoaxes

14. What are the forces of Nature affecting information security?
Forces of nature, force majeure, or acts of God are dangerous because they are unexpected and can occur with very little warning
Can disrupt not only the lives of individuals, but also the storage, transmission, and use of information
Include fire, flood, earthquake, and lightning as well as volcanic eruption and insect infestation
Since it is not possible to avoid many of these threats, management must implement controls to limit damage and also prepare contingency plans for continued operations

15. What are technical hardware failures or errors?
Technical hardware failures or errors occur when a manufacturer distributes to users equipment containing flaws
These defects can cause the system to perform outside of expected parameters, resulting in unreliable service or lack of availability
Some errors are terminal, in that they result in the unrecoverable loss of the equipment
Some errors are intermittent, in that they only periodically manifest themselves, resulting in faults that are not easily repeated

16. What are technical software failures or errors?
This category of threats comes from purchasing software with unrevealed faults
Large quantities of computer code are written, debugged, published, and sold only to determine that not all bugs were resolved
Sometimes, unique combinations of certain software and hardware reveal new bugs
Sometimes, these items aren't errors, but are purposeful shortcuts left by programmers for honest or dishonest reasons

17. What is technological obsolescence?
When the infrastructure becomes antiquated or outdated, it leads to unreliable and untrustworthy systems
Management must recognize that when technology becomes outdated, there is a risk of loss of data integrity to threats and attacks
Ideally, proper planning by management should prevent the risks from technology obsolesce, but when obsolescence is identified, management must take action

18. What is an attack?
An attack is the deliberate act that exploits vulnerability
It is accomplished by a threat-agent to damage or steal an organization's information or physical asset
An exploit is a technique to compromise a system
A vulnerability is an identified weakness of a controlled system whose controls are not present or are no longer effective
An attack is then the use of an exploit to achieve the compromise of a controlled system

19. What is a malicious code?
This kind of attack includes the execution of viruses, worms, Trojan horses, and active web scripts with the intent to destroy or steal information. The state of the art in attacking systems in 2002 is the multi-vector worm using up to six attack vectors to exploit a variety of vulnerabilities in commonly found information system devices

20. Define Virus
Virus - Each infected machine infects certain common executable or script files on all computers to which it can write with virus code that can cause infection

21. Define Hoaxes
Hoaxes - A more devious approach to attacking computer systems is the transmission of a virus hoax, with a real virus attached

22.  What is Distributed Denial-of-service (DDoS)?
DDoS is an attack in which a coordinated stream of requests is launched against a target from many locations at the same time

23. What is Back Door?
Back Doors - Using a known or previously unknown and newly discovered access mechanism, an attacker can gain access to a system or network resource

24. Define Dictionary attack
The dictionary password attack narrows the field by selecting specific accounts to attack and uses a list of commonly used passwords (the dictionary) to guide guesses

25. What are the various forms of attacks.
IP Scan and Atack
Web Browsing
Virus
Unprotected Shares
Mass Mail
SNMP
Hoaxes
Back Doors
Password Crack
Brute Force
Dictionary
Denial of Service
Distributed DoS

26. What is Denial-of-service (DoS) ?
attacker sends a large number of connection or information requests to a target
so many requests are made that the target system cannot handle them successfully along with other, legitimate requests for service
may result in a system crash, or merely an inability to perform ordinary functions

27. Define Spoofing
It is a technique used to gain unauthorized access whereby the intruder sends messages to a computer with an IP address indicating that the message is coming from a trusted host

28. Define Man-in-the-Middle
Man-in-the-middle is an attacker sniffs packets from the network, modifies them, and inserts them back into the network