Who: ShmooCon/NovaInfosecPortal.com
What: ShmooCon 2012 FireTalks
When: 1/27 to 1/28/2011
Where: Washington Hilton Hotel (1919 Connecticut Avenue, NW Washington, DC 20009)

Until OSSEC can have a better UI, I have decided to use the built in daily reports to automatically create tickets in our ticket system to be manually reviewed by security engineers documenting the steps taken to resolve what was identified.

In setting up the daily reports google helped me find the v2.5 documentation on the configuration options for daily reports (ossec.conf).  Some reports shown in the examples google found show access attempts or file integrity changes (examples).  This and other examples were very helpful in providing examples on how OSSEC could handle daily reports.

When setting up daily reports, the first thing to do is determine what variables will determine the report creation and the best way to do this is to use the ossec-reportd to  quickly test the various fields needed to search & create your reports.

For example, say you wanted to get the reports for file integrity changes in the 192.168.1 subnet, you would execute:

cat logs/alerts/2011/Jun/ossec-alerts-20.log | bin/ossec-reportsd -f group syscheck -f location 192.168.1

Valid ossec-reportd filters include: group, rule, level, location,user, srcip

Now to convert this into a daily report, edit: etc/ossec.conf, and add the following:

<reports>
<location>192.168.1.</location>
<group>syscheck</group>
<title>Daily OSSEC report: ZZ Syscheck Test Location</title>
<email_to>support@zzservers.com</email_to>
<showlogs>yes</showlogs>
</reports>

Rules can have the following options: group, categories, rule, level, location, srcip, user, title, email_to and showlogs.

The <showlogs> option is not listed on the ossec wiki and other documentation.  I only noticed it while reading through the source code trying to identify why the daily reports were not working for me.  It is a great option and determines whether the reports include or do not include the log items found when creating the report.

You can setup as many <reports></reports> as you need to within the ossec_config and they will all be generated when the ossec logs rotate at the change of every day.

However you may want to test your config or run reports without waiting for the automatic run at midnight. For those needing that functionality I have created the attached patch that can be applied within the ossec directory (cd ossec-hids-2.5.1; patch -p1 < ossec-dmz-forcedailyreports.diff).

This patch enables a “-R” option to ossec-monitord allowing it to be run from the command line processing all of the defined daily reports.  You may want to include the -d (debug) option if you are having problems or want to see what it is doing.

Please note that the -f (force foreground) is enabled by default when -R is selected.

Also, when researching what was needed for this patch I identified that the outgoing mail did not have 2 \r\n (\r\n\r\n) between the subject and the messages so the patch updates that so messages will be sent cleanly.

I also noticed that when ossec loads up the ossec.conf file it only accepts a-z,A-Z,0-9, – and _.  I had made the assumption that ossec-reportd used the same input details as ossec-monitord, however after hours of tracing I realized that the ossec.conf file was loaded with the prior mentioned input characters only.  So the config function was updated to allow “.” and “/” allowing for full neworks and log paths be entered.

Please let me know if I missed anything or if there are problems with my patch.

- David
- dmz

ossec-dmz-forcedailyreports.diff

diff -Naur -x ‘*.a’ -x ‘*.o’ ossec-hids-2.5.1/src/config/reports-config.c ossec-hids-2.5.1-manualreports/src/config/reports-config.c
— ossec-hids-2.5.1/src/config/reports-config.c    2010-10-12 19:17:37.000000000 +0000
+++ ossec-hids-2.5.1-manualreports/src/config/reports-config.c    2011-06-19 04:45:56.000000000 +0000
@@ -30,7 +30,7 @@
if((*mystr >= ‘a’ && *mystr <= ‘z’) ||
(*mystr >= ‘A’ && *mystr <= ‘Z’) ||
(*mystr >= ’0′ && *mystr <= ’9′) ||
-           *mystr == ‘-’ || *mystr == ‘_’)
+           *mystr == ‘-’ || *mystr == ‘_’ || *mystr == ‘.’ || *mystr == ‘/’)
{
mystr++;
}
diff -Naur -x ‘*.a’ -x ‘*.o’ ossec-hids-2.5.1/src/monitord/main.c ossec-hids-2.5.1-manualreports/src/monitord/main.c
— ossec-hids-2.5.1/src/monitord/main.c    2010-10-12 19:17:37.000000000 +0000
+++ ossec-hids-2.5.1-manualreports/src/monitord/main.c    2011-06-19 02:50:33.000000000 +0000
@@ -18,13 +18,19 @@

int main(int argc, char **argv)
{
-    int c, test_config = 0, run_foreground = 0;
+    time_t tm;
+    struct tm *p;
+    int c, test_config = 0, run_foreground = 0, generate_manual_reports = 0;
int uid=0,gid=0;
+    int today = 0;
+    int thismonth = 0;
+    int thisyear = 0;
char *dir  = DEFAULTDIR;
char *user = USER;
char *group = GROUPGLOBAL;
char *cfg = DEFAULTCPATH;

+
/* Initializing global variables */
mond.a_queue = 0;

@@ -32,11 +38,15 @@
OS_SetName(ARGV0);

-    while((c = getopt(argc, argv, “Vdhtfu:g:D:c:”)) != -1){
+    while((c = getopt(argc, argv, “RVdhtfu:g:D:c:”)) != -1){
switch(c){
case ‘V’:
print_version();
break;
+            case ‘R’:
+                generate_manual_reports = 1;
+                run_foreground = 1;
+                break;
case ‘h’:
help(ARGV0);
break;
@@ -198,6 +207,19 @@
/* Start up message */
verbose(STARTUP_MSG, ARGV0, (int)getpid());

+    if(generate_manual_reports)
+    {
+        /* Getting currently time before starting */
+        tm = time(NULL);
+        p = localtime(&tm);
+
+        today = p->tm_mday;
+        thismonth = p->tm_mon;
+        thisyear = p->tm_year+1900;
+
+       generate_reports(today, thismonth, thisyear, p);
+       exit(0);
+    }

/* the real daemon now */
Monitord();
diff -Naur -x ‘*.a’ -x ‘*.o’ ossec-hids-2.5.1/src/os_maild/sendcustomemail.c ossec-hids-2.5.1-manualreports/src/os_maild/sendcustomemail.c
— ossec-hids-2.5.1/src/os_maild/sendcustomemail.c    2010-10-12 19:17:37.000000000 +0000
+++ ossec-hids-2.5.1-manualreports/src/os_maild/sendcustomemail.c    2011-06-19 04:12:35.000000000 +0000
@@ -33,7 +33,7 @@
#define FROM            ”From: OSSEC HIDS <%s>\r\n”
#define TO                “To: <%s>\r\n”
#define CC                “Cc: <%s>\r\n”
-#define SUBJECT            ”Subject: %s\r\n”
+#define SUBJECT            ”Subject: %s\r\n\r\n”
#define ENDDATA            ”\r\n.\r\n”
#define QUITMSG         ”QUIT\r\n”

diff -Naur -x ‘*.a’ -x ‘*.o’ ossec-hids-2.5.1/src/shared/help.c ossec-hids-2.5.1-manualreports/src/shared/help.c
— ossec-hids-2.5.1/src/shared/help.c    2010-10-12 19:17:37.000000000 +0000
+++ ossec-hids-2.5.1-manualreports/src/shared/help.c    2011-06-20 04:13:07.000000000 +0000
@@ -21,12 +21,24 @@

void help(const char *prog)
{
+    int ismonitord = 0;
+    char helpopts[6];
+    helpopts[5] = ‘\0′;
+    snprintf(helpopts, 5, “Vhdt”);
+
+    if (strstr(prog, “monitord”))
+    {
+      ismonitord = 1;
+      snprintf(helpopts, 5, “VRhdt”);
+    }
print_out(” “);
print_out(“%s %s – %s (%s)”, __name, __version, __author, __contact);
print_out(“%s”, __site);
print_out(” “);
-    print_out(“  %s: -[Vhdt] [-u user] [-g group] [-c config] [-D dir]“, prog);
+    print_out(“  %s: -[%s] [-u user] [-g group] [-c config] [-D dir]“, prog,helpopts);
print_out(“    -V          Version and license message”);
+    if (ismonitord)
+       print_out(“    -R          Run daily report”);
print_out(“    -h          This help message”);
print_out(“    -d          Execute in debug mode”);
print_out(“    -t          Test configuration”);

East Coast Carriers:
· Global Crossing
· SAVVIS
· Cogent
· Verizon
· AT&T
· Tiscali
· Internap
· XO
· Level 3
· Sprint
· Cox Communications

About ZZ Servers headquartered in San Francisco, California. ZZ Servers delivers web hosting and datacenter services to meet current and future business compliance requirements from our facilities in San Francisco, CA and Ashburn, VA. For more information please visit www.zzservers.com or call 800-796-3574.

Contact:
Peter Zendzian
888-406-1838
peter@zzservers.com

If a phone is lost or stolen, your natural reaction may be to change your password. This is not a good idea, because changing the password will make it impossible to do a “remote wipe” of the phone. Fortunately, Kerio Connect offers a solution called “remote wipe”. A “remote wipe” will erase all data on the phone completely resetting all accounts, and in the case of most phones, erasing all apps and completely resetting the phone. Remote wipe is much more effective than changing a password because it protects the user’s privacy, and should be used instead. More information regarding the remote wipe feature can be found at ZZ Servers.

In the past, it was though Linux servers were safe from viruses but recently hackers have been taking advantage of this false sense of security. Some researchers point out that 70% of attacks on Linux honeypots were infected with a 6 year old virus (RST-B)* and used as command and control points for botnets.

ZZ Servers now offers affordable F-Prot anti-virus software for Windows, Linux, Exchange, BSD and Solaris. Protect your servers, desktops and critical infrastructure today. Contact ZZ Servers at 800-796-3574 or email support@zzservers.com to arrange for installation of anti-virus software today.

*RST-B is a backdoor malware runs on Linux/UNIX platforms and infects ELF files in the current and /bin directories. This Linux backdoor and virus compromises system security by allowing remote users to manipulate and access infected machines. If executed as root, it will start processes listening on two network interfaces which provide a remote root shell.

I was able to spend a good 1/2 an hour with the now new customer and help them understand how our approach meets the intent of PCI and is not focused only on trying to “make the sale.”  However, for those that we do not know what questions to ask of a hosting provider I have started a new project where I will be “shopping” for a new hosting provider and will post the communications I have with them, along with some additional comments on what their answers would mean to me if I was in my QSA role evaluating their solutions.  I will keep the communications anonymous to prevent any liability issues, but feel free to use any of the questions or comments I have when discussing hosting solutions with any providers you may be examining; and feel free to use my questions against us when you call and ask about PCI or Compliant based hosting with ZZ Servers.

With that in mind, here is the first discussion with a decent data-center with multiple data-centers fully owned and operated by their staff in the northern midwest.  I have highlighted items that caused me to be concerned about their understanding of PCI and what it takes for merchants or service providers to be hosted with managed PCI solutions.  Please note, anyone can take a rack of hardware and managed / deploy it in a compliant manor.  But that is not what these hosting providers are selling.  They are selling compliant solutions, leading customers who do not fully undersand the requirements to think they are meeting all of the requirements.

***Chat Information*You are now chatting with ‘Paul’
*Paul: *Greetings, my name is Paul. Welcome to <HOSTING PROVIDER> Sales. With
whom am I speaking? How may I be of assistance?
*you: *Hello, i saw your VPS servers have a $50/mo PCI certification?
what does that provide? Does that mean i’ll be compliant? do i need
anything else? does that include my scanning, pen test,
internal/external? log monitoring?
*you: *hello?
*Paul: *Hello, sorry about that
*Paul: *the PCI certification will include all scans for your server to
be entirely compliant
– This is common, many people belive that if you get your ASV scanning & answer questionairre you are compliant..if it was only that simple
*you: *so it is only the scans?
*you: *not the rest of the compliance needs?
*you: *internal & external scans then?
*Paul: *it covers all services needed
*you: *external logging/monitoring, firewalls, IDS, 2 factor remote
access, pen-testing (internal/eternal), asv scanning & internal scanning
(& other stuff i can’t remember atm)??
*Paul: *Yes, it is the complete service
– how can he say it’s scanning, then a complete service? At this point I really believe the sales guy does not know what he is selling
*you: *applicatoin & network penetration testing? how do you have that
for $50/mo? the best quote I have from a professional pen-testing
company is 5000/year
*Paul: *let me double check
*Paul: *yes, it does, I have confirmed
– confirmed? if you can’t tell by now that I am asking questions above his knowledge level; why not conference in someone who knows the answer..
– Many hosting providers want you to email or fill in a form so they can manage their response, if they can’t answer your quetions at all hours
– then are you sure they can manage your compliance needs at any hour?? Get them to bring the expert on the phone while you are asking questions!
*you: *interesting, do you have a detailed whitepaper or pdf on the
complete services offereed?
*you: *and i assume i’ll have to get more than 1 server
*Paul: *No, you can have PCIC with one server
– big big red flag!! If you are only using paypal/google for payments then yes this is right but if you are not then the requirement for “single use” is pretty important
*you: *and that includes firewalls too right? do i have a dedicated
rfc1918 address space?
*you: *you can?
*you: *how do you satisfy the “single purpose” requirement?
*you: *where a server can not be a web & database server
*Paul: *we do not require a cluster for pcic
– I wasn’t asking about a cluster. This is a typical issue, the sales team is use to selling hosting of servers but does not understand PCI. I guess they have not had
– any PCI training (which you merchants & service providers are required to have annually)
*you: *you do not, but PCI requires that
*you: *pci has something somewhere that requires each server have a
single function
*you: *do you have any documentation? or details about what is included
in your PCI services?
*Paul: *I do not have a detailed outline, but I know these are the
standards we follow
– Another warning…PCI is documentation heavy, if they do not have documentation, have they really done all thats required?
*Paul:
*https://www.pcisecuritystandards.org/security_standards/pci_dss.shtml
*you: *yes i am familiar with that
*you: *our QSA has ingrained tht into us
*you: *i was just curious because some of your answers do not jibe with
what the PCI-DSS requires
*you: *ok i think i have enough for now; thank you for your time
*you: *Have a great night..oh one last question; where are your
data-centers located?
*Paul: *My pleasure, they are in <LOCATION>
*you: *any other geographic areas?
*Paul: *they are all located in <ONE LOCATION>
*you: *thank you have a great night
*you: *oh one other questoin
*you: *what technology do you use for your remote 2 factor auth & vpn
technology?
*you: *rsa/certificates/?
*Paul: *The only vendors I have info on at the moment are control scan,
security metrics, trustkeeper, and clone systems
*you: *so it’s not included w/the pci service?
*you: *it’s a 3rd party vendor we have to engage?
*Paul: *Send me an email to <SALES-EMAIL> and I will find out for sure
– Remember earlier they said it included all required services? Again, lack of documentation & training lead me to think they just do not know what the requirements are or what they are selling
*you: *ok thank you, have a great night/morning

Merchant levels and Compliance Validation Requirements

Merchant Types

The “SAQ” is a self-validation tool for merchants and service providers who are not required to do on-site assessments for PCI DSS compliance. The SAQ includes a series of yes-or-no questions for compliance. If an answer is no, the organization must state the future remediation date and associated actions. In order to align more closely with merchants and their compliance validation process, the SAQ was revised and now allows for flexibility based on the complexity of a particular merchant’s or service provider’s business situation (see chart below). The SAQ validation type does not correlate to the merchant classification or risk level.

Service Provider Levels

Service providers are organizations that process, store, or transmit cardholder data on behalf of clients, merchants, or other service providers. Service provider levels are defined as:

By using the charts above, you should be able to easily determine your level and validation type. Knowing this details will go a long way in guiding you through your compliance but it is important to partner with other qualified businesses for your service. ZZ Servers provides PCI focused hosted infrastructure designed for PCI compliance and includes many of controls and measures required for your business infrastructure to be fully compliant.

In an update shortly after Webhostingtalk came back online, Dennis Johnson, an iNET Community Coordinator sent out a detailed post explaining all that was then known about the breech with a firm statement that “Absolutely no credit card or PayPal data was exposed.”

Today Inet Interactive, the owners of Webhosting talk relased the news no one wanted to hear.

ANNOUNCEMENT – 1:25pm est 04/07/09

This morning, the hacker who attacked WHT initiated further communication. He provided evidence that credit card information on one of our database servers was, in fact, compromised during that attack.

While it is surprising that a hacker who has done that much damage would contact the victim, especially with this level of damage but there were apparent motives.  What is currently being done is even more shocking.  A post at Web Host Industry Review mentions the hacker may have been motivated after the hack to release the cardholder data to the web because they “had downloaded and looked through the database files, and raised some concerns about the manner in which the credit card information was being stored.’ and that the file allegedly includes stored CVV/CVC information.

Now, I don’t belive mentioning PCI compliance here will be necessary but it is quite obvious that based on the details so far, the data was not stored in a PCI compliant manner.

One of the largest and possibly most hard hitting change is how the the certification process is placing an increasing amount of scrutiny on level 3 and 4 merchants. If you process credit cards and have not received any notification from your merchant bank regarding PCI DSS compliance, you will soon.

I will not attempt to cover all of the details of the new standard but will say if your company handles any cardholder data, it is important to get your infrastructure into compliance with PCI DSS.

PCI DSS 1.2 specifies 12 requirements for compliance, organized into 6 logically related groups, which are called “control objectives.”

The control objectives and their requirements are:

• Build and Maintain a Secure Network
  1. Requirement 1: Install and maintain a firewall configuration to protect cardholder data
  2. Requirement 2: Do not use vendor-supplied defaults for system passwords and other security parameters
• Protect Cardholder Data
  1. Requirement 3: Protect stored cardholder data
  2. Requirement 4: Encrypt transmission of cardholder data across open, public networks
• Maintain a Vulnerability Management Program
  1. Requirement 5: Use and regularly update anti-virus software
  2. Requirement 6: Develop and maintain secure systems and applications
• Implement Strong Access Control Measures
  1. Requirement 7: Restrict access to cardholder data by business need-to-know
  2. Requirement 8: Assign a unique ID to each person with computer access
  3. Requirement 9: Restrict physical access to cardholder data
• Regularly Monitor and Test Networks
  1. Requirement 10: Track and monitor all access to network resources and cardholder data
  2. Requirement 11: Regularly test security systems and processes
• Maintain an Information Security Policy
  1. Requirement 12: Maintain a policy that addresses information security

Each control objective contains additional details on what is required to meet the objective and requires a detailed study to fully understand them and their impact on your existing infrastructure. Smaller companies have the option to use a self-certification questionnaire but even this can be difficult and time consuming.

ZZ Servers has fully qualified security assessors and partnerships with PCI ASV/QSA’s for all levels PCI certification, required security scans and full level 1 PCI audit validation. Contact us today so we can can assist with your adaption of PCI DSS in your environment and ensure your full compliance with these comprehensive regulations. Let us help you prepare and prevent the damaging costs of a data breach.

Peter Zendzian
Managing Partner
ZZ Servers, LLC
www.zzservers.com
800-796-3574

One of the most valuable commodities in this day and age is your own personal information. The more we make purchases over the Internet or over the phone, in other words: not in person, the more important that information becomes.

However, as security breaches receive more coverage and are more well known to the public, trust in the current security measures is coming into question, and the need for stronger security and standardized tools and controls became necessary.

Enter the PCI DSS, or Payment Card Industry Data Security Standard. This was created by the five major credit card companies as a guideline to help merchants and other companies implement the necessary hardware, software, and other procedures to guard sensitive credit card and personal information.

The encouragement to achieve PCI compliance comes in a couple different forms: benefits and mandates. The mandates are the requirements of PCI compliance, and attached to them are some very strict and specific penalties. These could include fines as high as $500,000 per incident, and the loss of the ability to accept credit cards at all.

On the other hand, there are a number of PCI compliance benefits that should be as much of an incentive, if not more so, than the penalties. It merely requires a proactive understanding of the long term benefits of compliance. Some of these benefits, you will find, are somewhat more intangible than others, but that doesn’t make them any less valuable.

The first and most obvious benefit of PCI compliance is a simple matter of trust. What if your company was the one that recently suffered a major security breach? What if you had to live with the stigma of “the company that lost thousands of credit card number”? Could you ever live it down? Could you survive the fallout?

A giant company may be able to weather the storm (as has been seen in some recent cases), but most companies need to focus on building lasting trust from the beginning. Being PCI compliant can help you achieve this.

More tangibly, merchants who are PCI compliant are offered protection from the fines if you should happen to be breached. If you are compliant at the time you suffer an attack, you can have a sort of safe harbor.

At the moment, these “carrots and sticks”, or mandates and benefits, are assumed to be enough to encourage merchants to gain PCI compliance. But if it turns out, in fact, to not be enough, the PCI Security Standards Council will likely change the measures of encouragement. The reason for these measures is that trust is the only thing that will propel the online industry forward. If customers lose their trust in the system, they will find alternate methods to do business.

It is a difficult thing in the naturally competitive environment of online business to consider something as nebulous as “the greater good”, but in a world where personal information is so valuable, creating an environment where that information is utterly secure should be a top priority.

Andy Eliason is a writer for Main10, Inc. If you’d like to learn more about PCI compliance, or how to become PCI DSS compliant, visit Braintree Payment Solutions today and find out what they have to offer.