Speaker 1: Welcome to the deep dive.
Speaker 2: Glad to be diving in today.
Speaker 1: We're looking at network security, but maybe from a different angle.
Speaker 2: Yeah, definitely, we're looking at it through the hacker's eye,
Speaker 2: so to.
Speaker 1: Speak, right actively hunting for those weaknesses before they get exploited.
Speaker 2: Precisely, Our mission here is really to pull back the
Speaker 2: curtain on what's called hack attacks testing, okay, and show
Speaker 2: you how organizations can actually run their own security.
Speaker 1: Audits, So figuring out how vulnerabilities.
Speaker 2: Are found, exactly, how they're discovered, how systems are built
Speaker 2: just to test for them, and you know what tools
Speaker 2: bring these hidden dangers out into the light.
Speaker 1: And why should this matter to you listening in.
Speaker 2: Well, maybe you're prepping for a meeting or just trying
Speaker 2: to get up to speed on this stuff.
Speaker 1: Quickly, or maybe you're just curious.
Speaker 2: Right understanding this gives you a fast track, a shortcut
Speaker 2: really to grasping the complexity of digital security.
Speaker 1: Equipping you with insights into why strong defenses are just
Speaker 1: so critical today.
Speaker 2: And for this deep dive, we're drawing on some pretty
Speaker 2: specialized technical sources. Guides on audits using analytical tools the works.
Speaker 1: Looking at how the pros find the holes ethically, of course.
Speaker 2: Always ethically. It's about defense.
Speaker 1: So where do we start with this digital detective work?
Speaker 1: Building something called a tiger box.
Speaker 2: It's the first step. Yeah, a tiger box.
Speaker 1: And that's not just any old computer, right.
Speaker 2: No, No, it's a system specifically designed tuned really to
Speaker 2: find potential security weaknesses.
Speaker 1: Like a custom lab for finding vulnerabilities.
Speaker 2: That's a great way to put it. It's all about
Speaker 2: proactive defense, finding the holes before the attackers do, okay,
Speaker 2: and a really good tiger box A first rate one
Speaker 2: almost always uses a multiple boot setup.
Speaker 1: Multiple operating systems on one machine.
Speaker 2: Why because different operating systems have their own unique weak points, okay,
Speaker 2: and you need different tools to probe them effectively. So
Speaker 2: this multi system approach makes the audit way more comprehensive.
Speaker 2: You don't miss as much.
Speaker 1: Makes sense. So what os foundations are we talking about?
Speaker 1: Our sources mention a few key ones, Windows two thousand.
Speaker 2: Server yep, that's often part of the mix. And the
Speaker 2: setup choices are critical, like FAT versus NTFS for the filesystem.
Speaker 1: What's the difference there security wise?
Speaker 2: Well, FAT is a simpler maybe good for smaller drives
Speaker 2: or if you need MS dels access for recovery, but NTFS,
Speaker 2: especially for anything over say four hundred megs, is much better.
Speaker 2: It has transaction logs for recovery, so.
Speaker 1: Less data loss if something goes wrong.
Speaker 2: Exactly, and crucially better file security permissions. You get really
Speaker 2: fine grained control.
Speaker 1: And beyond the filesystem, things like active directory wyns, dns.
Speaker 2: Oh yeah, those are vital. Active directory for managing users
Speaker 2: in domains, wnzs for net bios names, dns for translating
Speaker 2: names to.
Speaker 1: IPS standard network stuff.
Speaker 2: Standard, but also prime targets if they're not locked down.
Speaker 2: Attackers use them to map your network or hijack services.
Speaker 1: Gotcha, Okay. Moving beyond Windows, MACOSX Tiger is also mentioned.
Speaker 2: Why include that because Apple's ecosystem, you know, people think
Speaker 2: it's inherently cure. Yeah, but it has its own specific vulnerabilities,
Speaker 2: different attack vectors, right, so you need tools like Apple's
Speaker 2: developer tools to probe it properly and maybe set up
Speaker 2: a port scanner infrastructure tailored for it.
Speaker 1: And then there are the Nix systems Unix.
Speaker 2: Linux, absolutely Essential, red Hat, Slackwar, Debian, Solaris, you name it.
Speaker 1: Why are they so important.
Speaker 2: For that raw command line control? They give you incredible flexibility,
Speaker 2: especially for server side vulnerabilities. They're powerful multi user multitasking.
Speaker 1: Systems, so the multios approach really is about covering all
Speaker 1: the bases like a Swiss army knife for security testing.
Speaker 2: That's it exactly simulating attacks from every angle possible.
Speaker 1: Okay, so we've built our tiger box, our digital skeleton key.
Speaker 1: Now what are we looking for? What are those common
Speaker 1: locks or back doors?
Speaker 2: It's funny a lot of systems practically advertise their weaknesses
Speaker 2: right from the start. The fault installs are a.
Speaker 1: Huge one, just the basic setup. Why does that leave
Speaker 1: things exposed?
Speaker 2: It often comes down to usability versus security. Developers want
Speaker 2: things to work out of the.
Speaker 1: Box, so they leave services running reports open that aren't
Speaker 1: strictly needed.
Speaker 2: Precisely in every single default setting is a potential door
Speaker 2: for an attacker. That the initial configuration is so so critical,
Speaker 2: maybe even more than patching later.
Speaker 1: Wow, and sticking with the basics. Weak passwords still.
Speaker 2: A thing, oh, massively. Systems with accounts that have no password,
Speaker 2: or policies that don't enforce strong ones.
Speaker 1: Easy targets for guessing or dictionary attack.
Speaker 2: Absolutely, even against encrypted password lists, you'd be amazed. Strong
Speaker 2: password policies are just fundamental, non negotiable. Really.
Speaker 1: Okay, now this next area sounds more technical, packet filtering
Speaker 1: and spoofing. What's the danger there.
Speaker 2: Well, if your network doesn't filter incoming packets properly, attackers
Speaker 2: can perform IPR DNS spoofing. They pretend to be a
Speaker 2: trusted computer on your network.
Speaker 1: And once they're inside the trust zone.
Speaker 2: They can potentially install back doors, set up ways to
Speaker 2: get back in easily later, like keeping a hidden key
Speaker 2: under the mat.
Speaker 1: Nasty related to that bind flaws. Bine is the DNS software.
Speaker 2: Right right, the Domain Name Service software. Outdated versions are
Speaker 2: notorious for vulnerabilities like what buffer overflows are a classic
Speaker 2: an attacker sends too much data, crashing the program or worse,
Speaker 2: tricking it into running malicious.
Speaker 1: Code, giving them system access.
Speaker 2: Potentially, Yes, finding old buy ing versions is a big
Speaker 2: red flag in an audit.
Speaker 1: Okay, what about SNMP community strings?
Speaker 2: That sounds less dramatic, you'd think so, But SNMP, the
Speaker 2: Simple Network Management Protocol, is used to manage network devices. Right,
Speaker 2: many devices ship with the default community string, basically a
Speaker 2: password set to public, and if you don't change it,
Speaker 2: an attacker can query your devices, map out your network structure,
Speaker 2: sometimes even reconfigure things remotely, or launch denial of service attacks.
Speaker 1: Wow, okay, so a public is like leaving the front door.
Speaker 2: Unlocked pretty much? Yeah, yeah, for anyone who knows to check.
Speaker 1: And finally, in this category viruses, these are different, more passive.
Speaker 2: Yeah, they're a bit different. They need a programmed to replicate.
Speaker 2: They copy themselves into other executable files, sometimes even the
Speaker 2: boot sector.
Speaker 1: Of a hard drive, and then they activate right.
Speaker 2: Activation, replication, payload delivery. That payload could be anything from
Speaker 2: annoying messages to deleting all your data.
Speaker 1: Often spread through email attachments right like those infamous.
Speaker 2: Worms exactly, or pirated software Yeah, infected discs. Sometimes just
Speaker 2: previewing an email in something like Outlook could trigger them.
Speaker 2: Back in the day, no clicking.
Speaker 1: Required, scary stuff. Let's make these vulnerabilities more real. Our
Speaker 1: sources mentioned specific examples found by security tools. The ISO
Speaker 1: Unicode vulnerability.
Speaker 2: Yes a classic. This affected Microsoft's web server ISA.
Speaker 1: How did it work?
Speaker 2: By crafting a special web request like adding lots of
Speaker 2: spaces in dot htr to a URL, you could trick
Speaker 2: the server into showing you the contents of files. It
Speaker 2: absolutely shouldn't have a subtle flaw huge impact.
Speaker 1: And the outlook datehead or buffer overflow you mentioned previewing, Yeah,
Speaker 1: that was wild.
Speaker 2: Especially crafted email header could cause a buffer overflow and
Speaker 2: run arbitrary code on your machine just by being retrieved
Speaker 2: by Outlook from the server.
Speaker 1: Before you even opened it, before.
Speaker 2: You opened to previewed it. It bypassed the usual user
Speaker 2: interactions deck very serious.
Speaker 1: Then there's Windows and t RPC services. Depletion sounds like
Speaker 1: it just crashes thing pretty much.
Speaker 2: An attacker connects to certain RPC services, sends junk data,
Speaker 2: and the system just keeps allocating memory and CPU until
Speaker 2: it freezes.
Speaker 1: A denial of service attack a simple.
Speaker 2: Effective one, yeah, takes the system offline.
Speaker 1: And it's not always these big dramatic exploits, is it.
Speaker 1: What about registry and wind lug on key.
Speaker 2: Permissions right, subtle but dangerous improper permissions on certain Windows
Speaker 2: registry keys could let an attacker plant trojan horses that
Speaker 2: run its startup or let.
Speaker 1: Them escalate their privileges exactly.
Speaker 2: Turn a regular user into an admin.
Speaker 1: Sneaky stuff and anonymous FTP logins. That sounds like an
Speaker 1: obvious one.
Speaker 2: It is, but it's still common. If an FTP server
Speaker 2: allows anonymous users and isn't configured very carefully, it could
Speaker 2: potentially allow access to entire drives, basically handing over the
Speaker 2: keys to your files.
Speaker 1: Okay, so we know what we're hunting for. Let's talk
Speaker 1: about the tools, the arsenal as our sources call it.
Speaker 1: How do we group these?
Speaker 2: We can break them down by function. First up, general
Speaker 2: vulnerability scanners.
Speaker 1: Like the Cerberus Internet Scanner CIS.
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's a good example. It's free, has a graphical interface,
Speaker 2: mostly looks for common Internet service ISSUESGTP, SMTP, FTP plus
Speaker 2: Windows NT problems.
Speaker 1: And it generates reports.
Speaker 2: Yep, ahml reports good starting points.
Speaker 1: Okay. Then there's something called Internet Scanner more comprehensive.
Speaker 2: Yeah. That one's more geared towards full network assessments. Lets
Speaker 2: you define specific scan policies, really tailor the tests, and
Speaker 2: the reports detailed often categorized by severity, helps you prioritize
Speaker 2: what to fix first.
Speaker 1: Makes sense. And the stat Scanner Yeah focuses on Windows
Speaker 1: and heavily.
Speaker 2: Yeah, claims to check for over one thousand NT vulnerability
Speaker 2: and it has a neat auto fixed feature for some
Speaker 2: common issues. Saves time, plus good reporting like executive summaries
Speaker 2: for management.
Speaker 1: All right, moving beyond general scanners, network mapping and discovery,
Speaker 1: Tiger Suite comes up again.
Speaker 2: Right, It's presented as a full toolkit. It has modules
Speaker 2: for different tasks like system status, inter networking sniffers. These
Speaker 2: capture and show you network traffic IP stats, TCP stats
Speaker 2: good for diagnostics or seeing if spoofing is happening. Okay,
Speaker 2: then it's discovery modules do things like finger DNS lookups,
Speaker 2: who equeries that basic infogathering that's crucial early on.
Speaker 1: And scanners within Tiger Suite yep.
Speaker 2: Ping scanners, IP range scanners, port scanners, even stealth port
Speaker 2: scanners to find active machines and open ports.
Speaker 1: Quietly, got it, And you can't talk network discovery without
Speaker 1: mentioning end map.
Speaker 2: Absolutely not end map. The network mapper is world renowned,
Speaker 2: famous for port scanning.
Speaker 1: But also for detecting operating systems.
Speaker 2: How does that work through TCPIP stack fingerprinting. It's fascinating.
Speaker 2: End Map send specific probes and analyzes the subtle ways
Speaker 2: different operating systems.
Speaker 1: Respond, even if no ports are open exactly.
Speaker 2: It looks at tiny differences in things like icmperror messages
Speaker 2: or initial TCP window sizes. It can often tell you
Speaker 2: the OS, sometimes even the version just from these tells incredible.
Speaker 1: Okay, what about more specialized tools for testing or even attacking?
Speaker 2: Chaping, ah taping, that's an advanced packet crafter. You can
Speaker 2: build network packets exactly how you want.
Speaker 1: Them, and it can do idle host scanning. What's that?
Speaker 2: Also called dumb scanning. It's a very stealthy technique. You
Speaker 2: spoof packets as if they're coming from some inactive machine
Speaker 2: on the network.
Speaker 1: So the target doesn't see your real address exactly.
Speaker 2: The responses go to the idle host and you infer
Speaker 2: information based on how that host behaves. It's complex, but
Speaker 2: very sneaky. Also great for firewall testing.
Speaker 1: Wow. Then there's cybercop Scanner CASL Custom Audit Scripting language.
Speaker 2: Right that lets auditors write their own little scripts to
Speaker 2: send very specific custom packets.
Speaker 1: Why would you need that?
Speaker 2: To test how systems react to unusual or malformed traffic,
Speaker 2: Like craft a weird ping packet and see if the
Speaker 2: firewall drops that are led it through fine grained control.
Speaker 1: And cybercop also had a crack program sound ominous?
Speaker 2: It does what it sounds like. Yeah. It takes encrypted
Speaker 2: password lists from a system and tries to guess the
Speaker 2: passwords using dictionary files, lists of common words, names, etc.
Speaker 1: Really highlights the danger of simple passwords.
Speaker 2: Absolutely a stark reminder.
Speaker 1: Okay, nearly there Advanced audit and reporting systems SAINT successor
Speaker 1: to SATAN.
Speaker 2: Yes, SAINT the Security Administrator Integrated Network Tool. It builds
Speaker 2: on the older SATAN tool designed to assess network security comprehensively.
Speaker 1: How does it organize findings?
Speaker 2: It classifies them by severity red for critical, yellow for serious,
Speaker 2: brown for potential issues, green for okay.
Speaker 1: And it checks against known lists yep.
Speaker 2: Like the SANDS Top twenty Internet security vulnerabilities, very so
Speaker 2: for prioritizing.
Speaker 1: And SARAH Security Auditor Research Assistant.
Speaker 2: Sarah's strength is remotely probing systems and storing all the
Speaker 2: findings in a database for analysis.
Speaker 1: Does it integrate with other tools, Yes, that's.
Speaker 2: A key feature. It can use end map, for instance,
Speaker 2: for better OS fingerprinting, combining strengths.
Speaker 1: So, taking a step back, what's the big picture of
Speaker 1: how all these tools work?
Speaker 2: Fundamentally, whether they're commercial or open source, they run modules.
Speaker 2: These are like mini tests specific checks for known vulnerabilities.
Speaker 1: And they sometimes try to exploit them.
Speaker 2: Sometimes, yes, in a controlled way. It's not just about
Speaker 2: thinking there's a vulnerability, it's about proving it exists and
Speaker 2: understanding the potential impact it confirms the weakness.
Speaker 1: Okay, so we've really covered a lot today, from building
Speaker 1: those tiger boxes, understanding common weaknesses.
Speaker 2: Right through to using this whole arsenal of tools to
Speaker 2: actually find them.
Speaker 1: It's been a deep dive for sure.
Speaker 2: And the main thing to remember, I think, is that
Speaker 2: this isn't a one off task. Security auditing isn't something
Speaker 2: you just do once and forget.
Speaker 1: It has to be continuous.
Speaker 2: Absolutely, Threats evolve constantly, systems change. It's an ongoing process
Speaker 2: essential for protecting digital assets. You can't just check the box.
Speaker 1: So here's a final thought to leave everyone with. In
Speaker 1: a world where systems are constantly being probed, tested, poked at,
Speaker 1: how does the very act of identifying these vulnerabilities, even
Speaker 1: when we do it ethically like we've discussed, how does
Speaker 1: that fundamentally change the landscape of digital trust and privacy
Speaker 1: for everyone?
Speaker 2: H That's a deep one, something to chew on