Security Basics mailing list archives
RE: Concepts: Security and Obscurity
From: "Ken Kousky" <kkousky () ip3inc com>
Date: Wed, 11 Apr 2007 21:43:45 -0400
But we're missing the policy implications that I tried to introduce. If you establish obscurity as a control you must undertake overt actions to protect obscurity. It is these very actions that prevent adequate vetting and review of the control and thus allow weak or even corrupt practices to infiltrate your control portfolio. Please review the use of National Security Letters by the FBI and the corrupting impact of the binding gag order claimed necessary to protect the security control. Obscurity frequently corrupts and should be seen as a control of last resort and not part of in depth portfolio. KWK -----Original Message----- From: listbounce () securityfocus com [mailto:listbounce () securityfocus com] On Behalf Of Young, Randy Sent: Wednesday, April 11, 2007 6:03 PM To: Joe Yong; security-basics () securityfocus com Subject: RE: Concepts: Security and Obscurity I agree heavily with you Joe. Security in DEPTH means multiple layers, and obscurity certainly does add one more dimension. Thank you for the well written response to clear up the misunderstandings going on.
-----Original Message----- From: listbounce () securityfocus com [mailto:listbounce () securityfocus com] On Behalf Of Joe Yong Sent: Tuesday, April 10, 2007 10:59 PM To: security-basics () securityfocus com Subject: Re: Concepts: Security and Obscurity I'm really curious to know if some of the folks who responded to this thread really gave the article a fair and honest chance by reading objectively or just jumped in and started hammering as soon as they saw the words security and obscurity in the same line. Half the responses are slamming security that is dependent exclusively or heavily on obscurity. Was that really what the article proposed? Show me where. It's been a while since high school English classes so I will be the first to admit I can misread things at times. From what I can tell, the article proposes that adding obscurity to an already well secured system can add benefits. While I think the analogy used in the article is pretty weak, the idea is not. Quite a few security researchers have done this but feel free to try it for yourself. Setup some server application that is a common target for attacks (just so you'll get some quick responses) using standard secure configuration and setup another one in exactly the same secure way but listening on some completely off-the-wall port and non-default protocol. Track how many attempts you get on each. Again, security that is heavily or solely dependent on obscurity is bad - I don't think there'll be a lot of contention there. However, Mr. Miessler is proposing that if you already have reasonable security measures in place, obscurity can provided an added layer. This actually does help in many situations. Is it a security cure-all? Well, is anything?
Current thread:
- Re: Concepts: Security and Obscurity, (continued)
- Re: Concepts: Security and Obscurity krymson (Apr 05)
- RE: Concepts: Security and Obscurity Ken Kousky (Apr 09)
- RE: Concepts: Security and Obscurity John Rodriguez (Apr 09)
- RE: Concepts: Security and Obscurity Ken Kousky (Apr 10)
- RE: Concepts: Security and Obscurity Ken Kousky (Apr 09)
- Re: Concepts: Security and Obscurity krymson (Apr 05)
- Re: Concepts: Security and Obscurity Pranay Kanwar (Apr 05)
- Re: Re: Concepts: Security and Obscurity levinson_k (Apr 09)
- Re: RE: Concepts: Security and Obscurity levinson_k (Apr 09)
- RE: Concepts: Security and Obscurity krymson (Apr 10)
- Re: Concepts: Security and Obscurity Joe Yong (Apr 11)
- RE: Concepts: Security and Obscurity Young, Randy (Apr 11)
- RE: Concepts: Security and Obscurity Ken Kousky (Apr 11)
- Re: Concepts: Security and Obscurity Joe Yong (Apr 11)
- Re: Concepts: Security and Obscurity Daniel Miessler (Apr 11)
- Re: Concepts: Security and Obscurity Daniel Miessler (Apr 11)