From: Eric Hacker (my.self@erichacker.com)
Date: Thu Nov 16 2006 - 15:41:47 EST
On 11/15/06, Joseph McCray <joe@learnsecurityonline.com> wrote:
> Have any of you ever taken the time to develop a list signatures and
> their corresponding tools and/or exploits that actually trigger every
> individual signature the IDS has?
I have not seen a comprehensive open toolkit. I know of the Mucus
project that is based on sneeze to generate false positives in snort
by creating attacks from snort rules. (sensorynetworks.com) I'm
personally not in favor of an automated approach to generating attacks
as I feel they miss too much, but this is the best way today to cover
lots of the attacks. I have not played with the whole coremark toolkit
that mucus is a part of, but it is supposed to do some of what you are
asking.
I am also hopeful that the openpacket.org project will be able to
collect traffic samples that can be manipulated with tcpreplay to
provide testing in many situations.
> I'm really looking for input, tips, ideas of ways to automate a lot of
> the testing. I'm looking for this especially for exploits - how did you
> systematically handle things like:
I think that the proper way to handle this is through software testing
mechanisms. What is required is to extend the typical unit test into a
more functional realm. There are already some tools heading in this
direction within perl's Test::Module space.
> 1. running a specific tool/exploit with varying parameters passed to it
perl.
> 2. verifying that the system was actually exploited
Perl's Test::Tail::Multi on CPAN.
> 3. verifying that the IDS alert actually triggered
Perl's Test::Net::Snort, caught in my employer's open source release
process, but looks good to be cleared once all the signoffs are
accomplished.
> 4. verifying that the service is still running after the attempted
> exploit (restart the service/reboot the box if needed)
Perl's Test::Net::Connect can do rudimentary checking.
Test::Tail::Multi may also be useful.
> 5. correlating 1, 2 and 3 above
Perl's Test::Distributed, a module that does not exist but I've
sketched an outline for and have several of the necessary components
working.
My focus has really been on the IDS testing and not the exploit
itself. My needs so far have not taken me to the point where the reply
to an exploit would be the signature response.
I think that if testing the IDS is what one is after, that one may be
better off setting up the victim to fake being exploited (or not)
instead of actually providing an exploitable system. Otherwise, one
needs a whole bunch of VM's running all different kinds of OSs,
configurations, patch levels and applications.
> I'm thinking a ton of scripting is going to be the secret here. Any
> ideas and feedback would be greatly appreciated.
Whatever means that you decide to use, here are some important considerations:
1) It should be modular.
2) Borrow as much as possible from existing testing frameworks such as
JUnit or Perl.
2a) Spend time writing tests and not reporting systems.
3) Tag each test with CVE or something similarly standardized.
4) XML makes data portable.
5) Realtime is better than time synchronization and post attack log
matching. I'm using Jabber for an out-of-band control channel.
I hope that give you some useful ideas.
Peace,
Eric Hacker, CISSP
aptronym (AP-troh-NIM) noun
A name that is especially suited to the profession of its owner
I _can_ leave well enough alone, but my criteria for well enough is
pretty darn high.
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