Re: Covert Channels

From: Michal Zalewski (lcamtufat_private)
Date: Wed Oct 23 2002 - 14:45:17 PDT

  • Next message: Michal Zalewski: "Re: Covert Channels"

    On Wed, 23 Oct 2002, Roland Postle wrote:
    
    > I disagree. How do you detect an attack (involving a low level buffer
    > overflow etc..) that rides inside an encrypted session?
    
    The whole issue of IDSes (and virus scanners) dealing with encrypted
    sessions (SSL, SSH, PGP mail, etc) is a mess in all aspects - no matter
    whether you talk about attack detection, covert channel detection, policy
    enforcement, etc, and it's a tough call - either a matter of host-based
    analysis on the endpoint; complex key management and transparent
    decryption; using centralized encryption mechanisms, or such. My statement
    applied only to sessions that can be viewed, either on the wire or on the
    endpoint. Yes, saying this may be too much, yet I still stand by the
    opinion this is the case in general, to which there may be some fairly
    specific exceptions.
    
    > Once again privacy and protection come head to head. Using encryption
    > compromises your network,
    
    Compromises the infrastructure, protects the information. You can't have
    privacy with compromised infrastructure, you can't have privacy if your
    sessions are being watched or tampered with... Don't we all love that?;)
    
    -- 
    ------------------------- bash$ :(){ :|:&};: --
     Michal Zalewski * [http://lcamtuf.coredump.cx]
        Did you know that clones never use mirrors?
    --------------------------- 2002-10-23 17:36 --
    



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