Sex, Hacking, and Politics of Unicorns





Presenting at Conferences for Dummies

I was watching Defcon Unlocked Presentations and was inspired to blog about it.

The conversation centered around new people and especially women and minorities who feel like their message or their voice is unsuited for public consumption, especially at large conference venues. Many people who I greatly respect weighed in on this topic, and I'd recommend it for watching. This is my take.

Know your message. Cater to an audience. You're not an imposter. Inspire people. Take it seriously. Don't be afraid of failure. Know your support. Design with intent. Presenting is a skill.


Password Science 301 - Attacker tricks

In my last two posts (Password Science 101 and Password Science 201), I talked about password security from an introductory view, and hit on some of the math involved.

In this post, I'll talk a little bit about shortcuts that make the math easier, and talk about some of the actual techniques attackers use to attack passwords more efficiently. This isn't designed to be a comprehensive how-to for attackers to crack passwords. It's mainly designed to help the slightly math savvy and curious average person understand a little bit about the mindset of attacking a password.

Password Science - 201, the intermediate view

In Password Science 101, I gave a quick, very beginner introduction about what every person with a password can do to make a difference in security.

This post will be a longer post that talks a little more about the math and how it works, so that you can get a glimpse into the mind of an attacker and what an attacker sees when they want a password.

Password Science 101 - Password security for Everyone

There's always a lot of press coverage about passwords whenever someone gets hacked.

Since passwords are something that everyone has some personal control over, it's a worthy message to put out there. That's right. You can make a direct difference to the security of your banking information, your credit card number, or your dirty secrets on the Internet. But how?

This blog post will give you 5 easy tips you can use with your passwords to personally make a difference in online security.


Priorities, CVEs, and CVSS

Even after processes are shored up, there will still be a need to prioritize what needs to be fixed next. Hopefully, with vetted and working processes backing up remediation efforts, this clean up will be manageable.

What to do next? Overwhelming operational areas with a giant list will only create a log jam. But, if we're focused on finding every weakness and trying to establish priorities, is that doing the same to TVM groups?

Stop using your vulnerability scanner for patch auditing!

Patch auditing is important, and you should do it, but your vulnerability scanner or sevice can (and should) do so much more.

Patching is designed to address the things you know about (or should know about). What about the things you haven't considered?

At first, this sounds counter-intuitive, but consider the goal for doing a vulnerability scan: to identify unaddressed weaknesses. If you have a patch management program, you already know about patches. If it has gaps, you need to know that, of course. But, what about security baselines? If you focus on auditing your patch management to the exclusion of all else (the noisiest aspect of vulnerability assessment), you run the risk of exposure due to misconfigurations that can be far worse than the patches you've missed.


How do I prioritize what to fix?

I spent about six years in vulnerability management before I decided to go be a penetration tester. I was frustrated by having to rely on the analysis of others, and on generalized guesswork to determine what made the biggest threat to the organization. I thought that being able to focus on security research and practical penetration would open my eyes to the realities of offense in a way that would help me make the most sense of security as a discipline.

What I found out was enlightening.


CarolinaCon X Crypto Challenge Writeup






Personalizing Data Security Part 3




Personalizing Data Security Part 2

Previously, we created a story that aligns data security with buying the best car for your only teenaged daughter. Now, let's explore the choice between vulnerability assessment and penetration testing - the consequences of your decision as a parent and car buyer.
Since you're tight on budget, you decide it's best to go with the thorough once-over. After all, if you opt for the test drive, you aren't going to find everything that's wrong, anyway. Your goal is to figure out how you should best spend your money now that you know your car has some flaws. Your objective is to figure out which flaws are the most serious, and address them with your wallet.

Personalizing Data Security Part 1

The problem with data security is that it isn't personal. Those who have the responsibility for security often don't have a personal stake. Sometimes, the issue is with jargon. So, let's have story time. What if your environment were a car? What if it wasn't someone else's data, but your child?

Let’s say you are a concerned parent. Your only daughter has just turned old enough to have her first car. You have shopped around for the right car to meet your needs and your budget, and you’ve bought something. But, now you need to make sure it’s safe. Not only does the law require you to meet certain requirements of auto safety, but would you feel terrible if something bad happened to your only daughter because you chose poorly? What about all of her friends who ride with her, and all the other people on the road?