Threat modeling framework under Creative Commons license.

Categories Privacy, Security

I am so happy that Citrix allowed me to release under Creative Commons license the threat modeling framework I developed in the last four months.

What was the challenge?

Doing threat modeling is one of the main requirements for almost any Agile organization. Most of the teams are doing it wrong, and as an award, they receive a false sense of security, which leads to products and services that attacker personas can easily exploit.

What’s the solution?

I created an agile visual threat modeling framework (code name: Protecto)

  • Set of tools and a 90-min workshop to start with it, and build much more secure products! 
  • A step by step guide to making the modeling together, often and with fun, for maximum efficiency.
  • A learning path that is fixing the four main flaws in our current way of doing threat modeling to build much more secure products!
  • It’s a way of working through a threat model.

It all starts with a yard, a beer tap, and a bunch of attackers.  If you are thirsty for knowledge – click here to read more…

Steganography API at your service.

Categories Open Technologies, Privacy, Security
API

Steganography is the art and science of embedding secret messages in a cover message so that no one, apart from the sender and intended recipient, suspects the existence of the message. 

The most common example is to hide a message in an image file without compromising how the image looks. The majority of the people are using the photos to share a fantastic moment or two and don’t know that they can contain a secret message.

What could be the use-case?

Someone can hack your phone and embed your text messages in the pictures you take and share in, say, Instagram. 

A not so happy employee can post a picture on your blog with a secret message embedded in it to share some trade secrets with your competitors. 

Another person can embed an exploit in a PNG ads image; JavaScript code would parse the PNG image, extract the malicious code, and redirect the user to the exploit kit landing page.

Steganography also is a well know method for exchanging information between spies. 

Even if it sounds like science fiction, this is a very viable threat against your systems and you.

Steganography Protector API

I have created a small API (as a Proof of concept) that could discover a secret message hidden in any image file.  

The end-point is here:

https://sapigate.herokuapp.com/steg

It accepts POST requests only. 

The input should be JSON encoded, and it should consist of a binary stream of your image.

Here is a Python example.

import requests
url = 'https://sapigate.herokuapp.com/steg' 
my_img = {'image': open('secret.png', 'rb')}
r = requests.post(url, files=my_img) 
print(r.json())

The result of the command can be:

{'message': 'Secret Message', 'status': 'sucess'}

I am planning to extend the API by adding more use-cases and documentation, but if you are free to start using it right away.

If you have any questions about it or it seems down, contact me via Twitter – @bogomep

A practical use

You could read all of your images from your blog and via the API to check whether they contain a secret message or not or to check for hidden traces of your last Instagram image.

If you are looking for a picture with a secret message inside – why don’t you test this one:

Involve your team members when you do your threat modeling.

Categories Privacy, Security

Most of the companies I worked for or know about have a bizarre threat modeling process. They count on the architect or the most knowledgeable person to do the threat modeling. It’s defined as a one-person job!

If your goal is to do it, because it’s one of the required artifacts for your service to go in production or any other stage, it may be the right approach. But this is no threat modeling; it’s a false sense of security. You call for harmful attempts against your system because you put all the eggs in one basket. 

It’s the exact opposite of the goal of a threat modeling session.

Involve your team members when you do your threat modeling.

Every person in your team has a unique perspective and a way of thinking about possible threats against any system. 

Every person has a different experience compared to the others. 

Every person has different emotions and morale. 

All of those qualities play a critical role in the threat modeling process.

Let me give you an example:

I started a fun and useful exercise, explaining the threat modeling goal by bringing people together in front of a virtual whiteboard and doing a threat modeling against a beer tap infrastructure. 

The challenge

We have a yard with a few doors to enter it. We also have the beer tap, a pressure system, key storage, and some power controls. We have two boundaries to protect.

The team members were encouraged to “go wild” and think just for 7 min about all possible threats they see against the infrastructure individually. 

Then I asked them to put virtual “sticky” notes near the components that could be threatened and discuss the findings as a team.

I did that with six groups from different geo-locations, and every time, I received different results. 90% of the threats were common, but 10% of them differed from group to group. This is how you make your modeling better.

To compare, I asked a few people to do this exercise alone for the same time, and the difference I saw was that the wisdom of the crowd identified with 40% more threats than a single individual. If this is not hard proof, which is it?

Involve your team members when you do your threat modeling. It’s the first step into your journey towards creating a bit more secure products.