In this article I will first talk about some misconceptions regarding what is considered a secure password and then about how you can leverage different technologies to help protect your different credentials.
In the past few years there has been a sharp increase in websites being hacked and their users’ passwords/hashes stolen, in parallel we are using online services for almost everything: to pay for your local pizzeria delivery or your electricity bill, access your bank account, connect to your work email, etc.
The common advice is to use different passwords for each site you register to, but most people don’t. It means that hackers can often reuse credentials they obtained on one website to access another.
One way to counter that risk would be to use some kind of formula so you remember a different password for each site you have registered to. This *could* be the best solution, as remembering a password formula means you do not have to write it do...
>>[READ MORE]
New Dropbox Issues and a work around
#48 - Posted on
18 August 2011 - Author: SM - Category: Security, Guides
More issues have been found with Dropbox, they were major issues and the researchers worked with the vendor to fix them before going public.
Although they are now fixed they highlight the time bomb Dropbox is for enterprise users as usage convenience and security risk ignorance means sensitive information is likely to be transferred centrally on Dropbox from many different companies and user profiles.
The 3 security issues discussed in the this article were:
– Hash value spoofing to access other customer’s data
– Stealing Dropbox hostID to access other customer’s data
– Potential replay attack when providing other customer’s data hash combined with any valid host ID (i.e.: the attacker’s host ID) to get access to the corresponding data.
One key point made in the article is ...
>>[READ MORE]
SANS Ondemand Training course: A few Tips
#38 - Posted on
21 April 2011 - Author: SM - Category: Conferences, Guides
I went to a SANS Forensic course (508) last year and a few weeks ago I decided to try something new… to stay at home and dedicate 5 days to do their Ethical Wireless Hacking training course (617).
Let me first say that the 617 training course was really good, the author of the course and the recordings were made by Joshua Wright who runs the http://www.willhackforsushi.com blog. He is very knowledgeable and his enthusiasm was even contagious through audio only. In fact this is a huge understatement! I was truly amazed by his skills, stories and training delivery!
So much that for 7 days I was up at 9am and worked until 2am each day on the different content material covered by the course.
As I almost lost my sanity and started dreaming of ToDS/FromDS bits and fuzzing I thought I would share a few tips on this type of training course.
– Check the last time the course was updated, and if there is an upco...
>>[READ MORE]
DoD Windows OS Security guides
#11 - Posted on
10 September 2010 - Author: SM - Category: Guides, Security
I have recently came across that Department of Defence website where they provide free and unclassified Windows Security Guides. From Windows 2000 to windows 7, they provide a set of checklist and “STIG” which stands for Security Technical Implementation Guides.
Having only checked the Windows 7 “STIG”, I found it a useful resource when one can get some ideas on how to secure/validate a windows 7 server configuration.
http://iase.disa.mil/stigs/content_pages/windows_os_security.html
...
>>[READ MORE]