J is for Jaded

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The ABCs of Information Security

Learning the ABCs is important to understanding the English language, and the ABCs of Information Security are important for understanding the basic concepts in information (and people) protection. These ABCs are written as education for people who don’t speak information security natively and serve as good reminders for those of us already fluent in this confusing language.

Here’s our progress thus far:

And now for “J”.

One is justified in their joy and jubilation from the judicious and just protection of information.

The jibes, jeers, judgement, and jitteriness of losing to jackanapes along our journey through the jargon, jabberwocky, jactitation, jostling and jackassery of our juvenile industry makes us justifiably jaded.

There you have it.

“J” is for Jaded

We’re not all jaded all the time, but too many of us jaded too often.

Feeling jaded seems to come with the territory. As someone who works in this industry, sometimes it feels like we’re fighting a fight that can’t be won, we’re losing ground, and that life has given us the short end of the stick. Given enough time in this industry, you’ll either become jaded or you’ve fought hard against becoming so.

If you’ve done something so much that it doesn’t excite you anymore but just leaves you tired, consider yourself jaded. If someone says you look a little jaded, it just means that you look tired.

– https://www.vocabulary.com/dictionary/jaded

The formal definition of “jaded”, courtesy of George Merriam and Noah Webster (not really, these two are long gone and Merriam Webster, Inc. was acquired by Encyclopedia Britannica, Inc. in 1964):

  1. Fatigued by overwork : EXHAUSTED
  2. Made dull, apathetic, or cynical by experience or by having or seeing too much of something.

Being fatigued, exhausted, overworked, dull, apathetic, and cynical are not things we should aspire to.

Jaded is Bad

There is nothing good about being jaded. People who are jaded are live a sad life, or at the very least, a life with less joy than there should be.

Here’s what Dr. Stephen Diamond (a clinical and forensic psychologist) has to say about jaded people:

bitter, jaded people tend to project a self-righteous attitude suggesting they’re justified in feeling resentment. They’re often bored and cynical. They observe and criticize more often than they participate. Because they believe they’ve been burned, they no longer have the trust necessary to build solid, positive relationships. They believe the world is unfair and freely express their impatience and anger. They no longer expect success, but don’t accept responsibility for their failures; instead, they blame others. They’re almost always irritable and frequently express annoyance in most situations.

The highlighted words represent traits that are too common with people in our industry, some of these people we know personally, and maybe one of those people is you.

Jaded people often lash out at others. Bitter sarcasm and criticism are hallmarks. They often feel like they’re victims of what they perceive as injustice. The injustice leads to resentment, anger, and general unhappiness. Jaded people are more likely to suffer from burnout, mental health issues (depression, anxiety, et al.), broken relationships, and chemical dependency (self-medication).

Again, think about people we know in our industry; the people we fight alongside every day. There are people we know personally who have a self-righteous attitude, criticize more than they should, and have lost patience with “dumb users” and/or “incompetent management”. Dialogs such as these are examples:

US: “We need to educate our users and constantly make them aware of information security dangers.”

JADED US: “Why waste our time or money? They don’t get it and they never will. They just keep clicking on links and choosing sh*tty passwords.”

OR:

US: “Let’s figure out a better way to communicate with executive management and the board. If they understood better, we’d be able to secure the budget we need.”

JADED US: “What’s the use? Management doesn’t give two sh*ts about information security!”

Someone who’s jaded has given up, lost hope, and just exists to exist. They’re debilitated and they’re debilitating to the people around them. Someone who isn’t jaded, is still fighting the good fight.  They’re relaxed, rested, energetic, and active. Jaded people have a negative impact. People who aren’t jaded make a positive difference, creatively solving problems and hoping for better outcomes. The truth is, jaded people hurt themselves and others. People who aren’t jaded help themselves and others.

Jaded people hurt themselves and others.

Jaded people are NOT bad people. Please don’t make this mistake. Often, they are good people who care(d) deeply about something. They care(d) so much, they took it personal and suffer(ed) for it.

To simple? Maybe, but the point is this; we need to do everything we can to avoid becoming jaded.

But how?

Start with a simple and honest self-evaluation; are you jaded? If you’re not sure, ask someone close to you. Then decide:

  • If you’re jaded, choose to come back or not.
  • If you’re not jaded, learn how to keep yourself from becoming jaded or not.

The mindset and skills are the same either way.

People who work in our industry often (or always) find our work stressful. When we become jaded, we negatively impact our quality of life and become much less effective in our work. Back to our definition of the word; jaded people are fatigued by being overworked and/or made dull, apathetic, or cynical by experience. Being jaded is not acceptable to me, and it shouldn’t be acceptable to you either. So, let’s do something about it.

Fatigued, Overworked, and Exhausted

People who work in our industry are some of the most passionate, motivated, and intelligent people anywhere in the world. We’re unique and we’re amazing! The passion pushes us to work our tails off, mostly without appreciation beyond our paycheck (we do get paid well though). Some of us work 50, 60, 70+ hour weeks, forgo vacations, and sleep much less than we should. Our passion will work against us when/if we’re not in balance. The constant hard-driving workload can lead to fatigue and exhaustion. Eventually, something has to give.

To make matters worse, it doesn’t matter how many hours we put in, security incidents are inevitable. No matter what we do, we cannot prevent all bad things from happening. When the bad thing happens, then “they” notice; the appreciation we longed for becomes condemnation. Nobody cares about the 1,000s of hours we put in, often while others weren’t watching. They want to know why the bad thing happened and who’s to blame.

Feeling any injustice? Oh, how we need tools to fight against becoming jaded! So, what to do?

Priorities

Somewhere along the line, we might get our priorities messed up. Our job is a job. We do it as well as we can, but we must recognize that work is not life. Work is part of life, but it is NOT life. Good priorities might look something like this:

  1. Faith
  2. Spouse (if you’ve got one)
  3. Family
  4. Work
  5. Friends

Notice how “self” isn’t listed? Self supersedes all priorities. Self-preservation is primal.

You could switch #4 (Work) on the list with #5 (Friends) and still be OK. Regardless, work is NOT in the top three. Bad priorities look like this:

  1. Work
  2. Fame
  3. Money
  4. Spouse
  5. Work
  6. Family
  7. Work
  8. Friends

The first list lends itself to health, the second list lends itself to becoming fatigued, overworked, and exhausted. Couple messed up priorities with the nature of our work; guaranteed failure (if failure is defined as preventing all bad things), and you have a recipe for becoming jaded.

Health (Spiritual, Mental, and Physical)

All health requires maintenance. If we’re not maintaining our health, we can expect it to fail (eventually) and we can expect it to suck.

This isn’t the place or time to preach Jesus to you, but we all need a spiritual “higher power”. This is the place we go when the world doesn’t make sense, and we all know the world doesn’t make any damn sense, right?! If you need help finding a spiritual advisor, reach out to a close personal friend for guidance. If you don’t have a close personal friend to trust for this guidance, you get my advice; seek Jesus! That’s all the preaching you’ll get (for now).

According to the National Institute of Mental Health, nearly one in five U.S. adults live with a mental illness (51.5 million people in 2019), and less than half (44.8% or 23.0 million people in 2019) received mental health services. Think about these numbers for a second. Due to the nature of what we do and the stress related to it, the percentages for us are probably worse than the U.S. population. Most of us rely VERY heavily on our minds, and if our minds our broken, then what? If you need help, or think you might need help, here are some great resources to check out (DO NOT IGNORE THIS):

It’s easy to overlook our physical health, but we can’t. Most of us sit for hours on end at a computer keyboard. This is not healthy. We must get up, get out, exercise more, and eat healthier. There’s nothing glamorous about dying of a heart attack while reverse engineering a piece of code.

Our health has a direct impact upon being jaded. The more unhealthy we are, the more likely we are to become jaded. The inverse is also true.

Dull, Apathetic, and Cynical

The second part to our definition of “jaded” is being dull, apathetic, and cynical by experience or by having or seeing too much of something.

Seriously, how many times have we:

  • Seen someone click a link they shouldn’t have?
  • Witnessed someone fall for a phishing attack after we’ve taught them a kajillion times not to?
  • Read about a breach that should have been prevented?
  • Told people to master the basics, only to see them NOT compile/maintain an asset inventory?
  • Shaken our heads at dumb mistakes people (including “we”) make?
  • Beat our heads against the wall trying to get management to give a sh*t?

After a while, shouldn’t we just give up? What’s the use? People keep doing dumb things and making crappy decisions. Aren’t we tired of it yet?!

Spoken like someone who’s jaded.

Maybe it’s not them. Maybe it’s us.

Expectations

Maybe we’re jaded because we have too many or the wrong expectations. We’re less likely to become jaded when things go well, when we experience things that are good (or exceed our expectations). It’s not like we’d say:

  • “Dammit, Jane in accounting picked a great password again!”, or
  • “Life would be so much better if Joe would just click links without thinking more often.”, or
  • “It just sucks when management always gives us the budget we need for information security.”

Absolutely not. Some (or a lot) of our jadedness comes from being disappointed. We’re setting the wrong or unrealistic expectations, leading to disappointment, leading to frustration, leading to becoming jaded. We think expectations are good, but they’re often not.

What did we expect in the first place? Did we actually expect humans to NOT be human? Did we expect management to treat information security like it was THE issue versus AN issue? Did we expect people to listen to us when we don’t speak their language? Did we expect to not have breaches? Did we expect such a thing as risk elimination, or did we realize this is actually about risk management?

If we set any expectation, we should expect to be disappointed if we have expectations. Expect disappointment, and if it happens often and long enough, it WILL lead to frustration. Frustration is the last step in the path to becoming jaded. This is the “jade cycle” (simplified), see diagram.

The math: (-e + e2) = -d + -j, where e is expectations, e2 is better expectations, d is disappointment and j is jadedness. Essentially, fewer expectations and better expectations = less disappointment and less jadedness. Living life without expectations is NOT the goal, living a life with fewer and more realistic expectations is the goal.

NOTE: The exception is computers and other logical, binary things. We can always expect computers to do what we tell them to do. Care must be taken with emotional and non-binary (analog) things like human beings.

Summary

Beware and be aware of jadedness in yourself and others in our industry. It makes us less effective and it steals our joy. If you need help, ask for it. Being jaded is more common than many of us realize, and it does nothing to help our cause. The cause being better information security, and through it, better lives.

This is no honorable mention for “J” because it’s a letter we don’t use enough. 😉

Next up, “K”. What are some good relevant words for this letter?

I is for If

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The ABCs of Information Security

Learning the ABCs is important to understanding the English language, and the ABCs of Information Security are important for understanding the basic concepts in information (and people) protection. These ABCs are written as education for people who don’t speak information security natively and serve as good reminders for those of us already fluent in this confusing language.

Here’s our progress thus far:

Now for “I”…

“I” is for “if”.*

What if we were less ignorant, imperious, incoherent, irksome and impetuous, but a little more integrous, inoffensive, instrumental, interpersonal, and ingenious? Would we be less inundated with incessant information security incidents?

What if we were less inept and imprudent with the technology that’s so intertwined with every aspect of our daily lives? Would it even be possible to become impenetrable, impregnable and impervious to interminable attacks?

What if?

If we do more of the right things right, and less of the wrong things wrong, just think how much better off we’d be. The people we serve would be safer, we would be saner, and the world would be a better place!

The keys to making “if” closer to reality are less ignorance and more integrity.

What if we were less ignorant?

Ignorance is the lack of knowledge, understanding, or information about something.

Ignorance runs rampant within our industry and amongst the people we serve. People don’t know what information security is or what their personal responsibilities are.

If we were less ignorant, we’d know what information security is, and we’d know that it cannot be separated from privacy or physical safety. We’d know the importance of information security basics, and we’d practice them religiously.  If we were less ignorant, we’d know how vulnerable we are and we’d demand better of ourselves. We’d know what we’re responsible for and what we should hold others accountable for. If we were less ignorant, we’d think twice before plugging that new sexy gadget into our home network. We’d demand more protection in the products and technologies marketed and sold to us incessantly.

By definition, we’re all ignorant. Nobody knows everything, but this isn’t the issue. The issue is being ignorant of something we shouldn’t be ignorant of.

Is it OK to be ignorant of:

  • computer security best practices if you use a computer?
  • Internet security best practices if you use the Internet?
  • what things are running on your home network if you have a home network?
  • online safety best practices if you have loved ones (kids, spouse, et al.) who are online?
  • the most significant organizational security risks if you’re the leader of the organization?
  • information security basics if you’re in charge of information security?

The answer in all these circumstances is “NO”. It’s NOT OK to be ignorant of things you are responsible for.

In today’s world, we can no longer separate information security from privacy or safety; even personal, physical safety. Everything is integrated. A single information security incident has the potential to expose private information, but even worse, it has the potential to kill someone. The truth is, information security is a life skill that all people should must learn. Everyone has responsibilities, so what are yours?

Accepting ignorance is a default response when people are confronted with something that seems too complex, too confusing, too technical, or too anything. The key to fighting ignorance is simplification and mastering the basics. The basics are boring, the basics aren’t sexy, but despite these things, the basics are absolutely necessary.

So, what are the unsexy basics?

The first basic principle is to define rules for the game.

At Home
  • If you’re the head of your household, you’re the boss and you make the rules. It’s NOT OK to accept ignorance in this role. Learn what good information security behaviors are, lead by example, and expect others to follow. Ultimately, every bit of data that traverses your home network, every website visited by you and your family members, every device you plug in, everything is your responsibility.
  • If you’re not the head of your household, your job is to follow the rules and provide respectful feedback. No rules? Go see the head of your household and help them define the rules.

Go check out S2Me, it’s a FREE and SIMPLE personal information security risk management tool.

At Work
  • If you’re the CEO (or whatever title sits at the top of the org chart), you’re like the head of the household (above) for your organization.
  • If you’re not the CEO, your job is to follow the rules and provide respectful feedback. No rules? Go see the CEO (or his/her assistant) and help them define the rules.

Quick sidenote: This isn’t the article about writing rules for you, but maybe “R” will stand for rules (later).

No rules = chaos, anarchy, confusion, and disorder. There must be rules. You either define the rules and follow them, or you follow them and provide feedback. Now that you’ve read this, you cannot claim ignorance. You have knowledge, and now you must act.

Knowledge without action is negligence.

I’m not a lawyer, so I won’t give legal advice. The generic definition of negligence is “failure to take proper care in doing something”.  Are you negligent if someone suffers because:

  • you don’t know the right thing to do, but you should?
  • you know the right thing to do, but fail to do it?

Ignorance isn’t bliss, it’s breach.

More than once, I’ve heard the comment “ignorance is bliss”. Ignorance for something you shouldn’t be is nothing more than an excuse for laziness and genuinely not giving a sh*t.

What if we were more integrous?

Integrous is the adjective form of integrity.

Integrity is an oft-used word in our industry, and here’s the definition:

  • the quality of being honest and having strong moral principles that you refuse to change
  • someone’s high artistic standards or standards of doing their job, and that person’s determination not to lower those standards:
  • the quality of being whole and complete

Integrity applies to our industry in (at least) two ways; the integrity of data and the integrity of personnel responsible for protecting data.

Integrity of Data

If you’ve been in our industry for any amount of time, you’ve surely heard of the CIA triad. It’s an acronym for a fundamental concept; we protect the Confidentiality, Integrity, and Availability of data. Our “I” in CIA refers to the wholeness, completeness, and accuracy of the data we try to protect.

Simple. It’s important to remember that our job goes beyond making sure data is kept secret; we also need to make sure it’s accurate and available (to those who are authorized to access it).

Integrity of Personnel

On this point, it’s hard not to rant. To keep us honest, we’ll over-simplify.

In our industry, there are the practitioners who work their tails off to protect people, and there are suppliers who make things practitioners use to protect people. Practitioners and suppliers; integrity is paramount to both. A lack of integrity in either is terrible and sad.

Practitioners

The person behind the keyboard is an integral part of any information protection strategy. Their integrity must be rock solid and continually verified. Background checks, character references, solid OSINT, etc., are all encouraged before hiring anyone. Address the questionable things before hiring, and not after you’ve given them the keys to the kingdom. Depending upon your comfort level, sensitivity of the job, etc., questionable things should be questioned, but they don’t always need to be a disqualifier. Giving people the opportunity to address the questionable things from their past might be good, given that people change (hopefully for the better).

Verify integrity constantly. At work, a practitioner shouldn’t mind having his/her activities monitoring continually. They should see the value in it.

Suppliers

What’s worse, an attacker stealing $100,000 from your organization’s bank account or someone selling you security software that doesn’t work, or you can’t use, or you don’t need, or…? They’re both bad and either way you’re out a hundred grand. Stolen (or wasted) money is money your organization can’t use for better things; market expansion, employee benefits, innovation, etc. Suppliers who sell something to a practitioner when they know it’s not the right thing are like wolves in sheep’s clothing; almost worse than an attacker because at least you know the attacker is bad.

There are many suppliers who operate with integrity in our industry, but we must do a better job weeding out the ones who aren’t.

Summary

There you have it. “I” is for “if”. What if we were less ignorant and more integrous? Things would be much better around here.

*NOTE: “If” was inspired by my good friend Chris Roberts. Thanks!

Episode 110 Show Notes – All Hell Broke Loose

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Welcome! These are the show notes for episode 110 of the UNSECURITY Podcast.

We’re putting the Information Security @ Home series on hold again this week. In case you didn’t know, it seems we have a big problem on our hands. Over the course of this last week (or so), we’ve witnessed events in our industry that we’ve not seen before, in terms of magnitude and impact. It all started (publicly) with FireEye’s announcement of an intrusion and exfiltration of data. FireEye is one of the largest and most respected firms in our industry, so this was big news!

Unfortunately, this was only the tip of the iceberg.

Over the weekend, we learned of two more really significant breaches; one at the U.S. Treasury Department and the other at the U.S. Commerce Department. On Monday (12/14), all hell sort of broke loose when we learned that these breaches are all related, and the source is SolarWinds. Attackers compromised SolarWinds defenses and inserted malware into their premier product, the Orion platform. Orion is a network management system (NMS) used by thousands of organizations to manage and monitor their IT infrastructure. SolarWinds has become a single source of possible intrusions into ~18,000 other organizations. These intrusions into the other organizations aren’t run of the mill either, these are intrusions using “trusted” software (often) configured with elevated/privileged access. This and will continue to get worse before it gets better.

Seems 2020 isn’t done 2020ing yet. The end of 2020 countdown at the time of this writing:

Other things? Yes, or course!

There are always many, many things going on around here (SecurityStudio and FRSecure). One very newsworthy event included the announcement from the State of North Dakota. North Dakota has made our S2Me (personal information security risk assessment) available for all state residents and will use it to help their citizens be more secure at home! One down, and 49 left to go!

Alright, on to it. Brad’s leading the discussion this week, and these are his notes. GOOD NEWS, we’ve invited our good friend Oscar Minks to join us as we delve in to the whole SolarWinds debacle.

SHOW NOTES – Episode 110

Date: Tuesday December 15th, 2020

Episode 109 Topics

Opening

[Brad] Hey there! Thank you for tuning in to this episode the UNSECURITY Podcast. This is episode 110, the date is December 15th, 2020, and I’m your host, Brad Nigh. Joining me as usual is my good friend and co-worker, Evan Francen. Good morning Evan.

[Evan] Cue Evan.

[Brad] Also joining us this morning is another good friend and co-worker, Oscar Minks. Good morning Oscar.

[Oscar] Cue Oscar.

Quick Catchup

[Brad] As if 4th quarter wasn’t crazy enough we had the SolarWinds news break this week.  Before we dig into that let’s catch up and see how we are all doing with just over 2 weeks left in the year. What’s new?

Transition

Information Security @ Home
All Hell Broke Loose

[Brad] Well, we planned to do more security at home stuff, but as I said a couple weeks ago, 2020 won’t stop 2020’ing.

Topics

  • SolarWinds breach (only the beginning)
  • The timeline (FireEye announcement)
  • FireEye, U.S. Government, (possibly) 425 of the Fortune 500, and (probably) 18,000 organizations.
  • What happened?
  • What are the ramifications of all this?
  • What do you need to do?
  • What do we need to do?

Discussion between Brad, Evan, and Oscar

[Brad] 2020 is not going quietly into the night, is it? Alright, moving on for now.

News

[Brad] Amazingly SolarWinds wasn’t the only news in the last week. We probably won’t have time to get to all of these but they are good reads and good to stay on top of.

Wrapping Up – Shout outs

[Brad] That’s it for episode 110. Thank you Evan and Oscar! Who you got a shoutout for today?

[Evan & Oscar] We’ll see.

[Brad] Thank you to all our listeners! Send things to us by email at unsecurity@protonmail.com. If you’re the social type, socialize with us on Twitter, I’m@BradNigh and Evan can be found @evanfrancen.

Lastly, be sure to follow SecurityStudio (@studiosecurity) and FRSecure (@FRSecure) for more things we do when we do what we do.

That’s it! Talk to you all again next week!

Episode 109 Show Notes – Information Security @ Home

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This is Episode 109, and we’re continuing our Information Security @ Home series.

We’re smack dab in the middle of the holiday season. Lots of people are going to receive neat, new electronic gadgets as Christmas gifts. Who doesn’t like cool new gadgets?! Your refrigerator can order milk before you’re out of milk, your dishwasher can send you messages when the dishes are done, your television can remind you it’s time to veg out on the couch for the latest episode of The Undoing, and your doorbell can show you who’s at the door while you’re away. We LOVE gadgets! (even if they end up killing us)

But wait! What about information security? What about privacy? What about safety?

Herein lies some problems. Problems that we (infosec folks) want to help you avoid.

Information security is an afterthought, if it’s ever a thought at all! We continue to connect more devices, install more apps, and stream more things. Home networks become more complex, and most people don’t even know what they’re trying to protect. This is your home network, and it’s your responsibility to use it responsibly. Nobody cares about the protection of you and your family more than you. It’s time to step up and learn some basics before this gets any more out of hand. (it’s already out of hand, but it’s not too late)

So…

In case you didn’t know, we’re less than 16 days from Christmas!

…and less than 23 days left in 2020!

I’m not sure what I’m more excited for at this point, Christmas or 2021. 2020 can suck it. Well, I guess it already has. Here’s to an awesome end to an ______ year!

I’ll (Evan) be leading the discussion this week, and these are my notes.

SHOW NOTES – Episode 109

Date: Wednesday December 9th, 2020

Episode 109 Topics

  • Opening
  • Catching Up
  • Information Security @ Home
    • Picking up where we left off in episode 108
    • Demonstration – The router/firewall
      • Finding your router.
      • Logging into your router.
      • Changing the default password.
      • Poking around a little bit.
    • What’s on your network anyway? You can’t possibly protect the things you don’t know you have.
  • News
  • Wrapping Up – Shout outs
Opening

[Evan] Hey oh! Welcome to episode 109 of the UNSECURITY Podcast. We’re glad you’ve joined us. The date is December 9th, 2020 and I’m your host Evan Francen. Joining me is my pal and co-worker, Brad Nigh. Good morning Brad!

[Brad] Cue Brad.

[Evan] It’s nice to come up for air this morning, and it’s nice to hang out with you man. How you doing?

Quick Catchup

It’s 4th quarter, I’m now a week and a half behind and it’s only getting busier. Hopefully Evan is in a better mood than episode 106.

We’ll discuss a thing or two…

Topics:

Transition

Information Security @ Home

[Evan] Last week, we got into some of the important things we should be doing at home. When I say “we” I mean everybody, security people and non-security people alike. We mentioned that step #1 should be to change the default password on your home router. We talked about it, gave some advice, and pointed people in the right direction. Today, I’d like for you and I to demonstrate how to change a router password and talk about it while we’re doing it. After this, we’ll poke around a little inside the router’s configuration. Once we’re done with that, we can move on to the next task; finding out what’s on your network.

Sound good?

[Brad] Cue Brad.

Begin discussion

Information Security @ Home Discussion

  • Picking up where we left off in episode 108
  • Demonstration – The router/firewall
    • Finding your router.
    • Logging into your router.
    • Changing the default password.
    • Poking around a little bit.
  • What’s on your network anyway?
    • Why is this important?
    • What you should do next…

Transition

[Evan] Alright. Good stuff. Hopefully our listeners learned a thing or two. For those who already knew this stuff, hopefully they’ll share with others.

That’s that. On to some news…

News

[Evan] Crazy stuff going on in this industry. What’s new? Well, here’s a few things that caught our eye this week:

[Evan] That’s a lot of news for one day, and that’s only the tip of the iceberg.

Wrapping Up – Shout outs

[Evan] That’s it for episode 109. Thank you to all our listeners. We dig you. Also, thank you Brad! Who you got a shoutout for today?

[Brad] We’ll see.

[Evan] Next week, we’ll continue the Information Security @ Home discussion. We’ll dig in a little more on identifying system on your home network and talk about patching. In the meantime, send things to us by email at unsecurity@protonmail.com. If you’re the social type, socialize with us on Twitter, I’m @evanfrancen and this other guy is on Twitter at @BradNigh. Lastly, be sure to follow SecurityStudio (@studiosecurity) and FRSecure (@FRSecure) for more things we do when we do what we do.

That’s it! Talk to you all again next week!

2020 Holiday Shopping Safety Checklist

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Just finished putting together this shopping safety checklist. Share freely and enjoy.

Wishing everyone a SAFE, HEALTHY, and HAPPY holiday season!

Direct download link: https://bit.ly/3qkq5uT

Click to access SecurityStudio_HolidayShoppingChecklist.pdf

Episode 108 Show Notes – Information Security @ Home

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NOTE: We’ll be a day late this week, recording on Wednesday. Work stuff and personal stuff, you probably know what it’s like.

It’s time for episode 108 of the UNSECURITY Podcast!

Brad and I (Evan) hope you had a wonderful Thanksgiving (assuming you’re in the U.S.). 2020 is a funky year to say the least. So many things that were “normal” before, aren’t so normal anymore. Despite the craziness of this year, we still found MANY things to be thankful for:

  • Our faith, and knowing that everything is going to be OK (eventually).
  • Our family.
  • Our friends.
  • Our co-workers.
  • Our community (the infosec community and our home community).
  • The people we serve.

While acknowledging that some of us have suffered significant losses this year, there’s always something to be thankful for. If you ever need support in dealing with loss or you’re just struggling, reach out to people around you. Here are some resources you might find helpful:

Love truly heals.

Some of us had a couple days off work last week. Monday we jumped right back in. The emails were still there (and maybe more of them), the projects are still in full swing, reports are still due, etc., etc. Assuming you recovered from the Monday onslaught, here we are! It’s Wednesday, and it’s time for episode 108!

Brad’s back, he’s leading the discussion today, and these are his notes. Welcome back Brad!

SHOW NOTES – Episode 108

Date: Wednesday December 2nd, 2020

Episode 108 Topics

  • Opening
  • Catching Up
    • What’s new?
    • Thanksgiving hangover?
  • Information Security @ Home
    • Picking up where we left off in episode 106
    • Why is this a big deal (personally and for employers)
    • What can we do about it?
    • Intro to what Brad and Evan do.
  • News
  • Wrapping Up – Shout outs
Opening

[Brad] Hey there! Thank you for tuning in to this episode the UNSECURITY Podcast. This is episode 108, the date is December 2nd, 2020, and I’m your host, Brad Nigh. Joining me as usual is my good friend and co-worker, Evan Francen. Good morning Evan.

[Evan] Cue Evan.

[Brad] This will be first time I actually get to talk to you about why yesterday was my first day back since 11/17.  I have no idea what you’ve been up to because I was basically totally offline.

Quick Catchup

It’s 4th quarter, I’m now a week and a half behind and it’s only getting busier. Hopefully Evan is in a better mood than episode 106.

We’ll discuss a thing or two…

Topics:

  • 4th quarter is notoriously busy, like VERY busy, for us. Everyone is running at 100% capacity right now, which is good, but also stressful.
  • What’s going on at work? Any cool developments or announcements? Heck yeah there are!
  • Security Sh*t Show – no show last week. It was Thanksgiving!
  • Back to book writing…

Transition

Information Security @ Home

[Brad] Well, we had planned to do this last week, but 2020 won’t stop 2020’ing.

[Brad] We are going to go into more details about some of the things we do, hopefully without giving away too much, to try and help others. I feel like this could end up just about anywhere, so it should be fun!

Begin discussion

Topic Ideas:

  • Picking up where we left off in episode 106
  • Why is this a big deal (personally and for employers)
  • What can we do about it?
  • Intro to what Brad and Evan do.
  • Maybe we’ll show some examples and stuff while we’re here.

Transition

[Brad] Alright. That’s that. On to some news…

News

[Brad] Always plenty of interesting things going on in our industry. Here’s a few stories that caught my attention recently:

Wrapping Up – Shout outs

[Brad] That’s it for episode 108. Thank you Evan! Who you got a shoutout for today?

[Evan] We’ll see.

[Brad] Thank you to all our listeners! Send things to us by email at unsecurity@protonmail.com. If you’re the social type, socialize with us on Twitter, I’m @BradNigh and Evan can be found at @evanfrancen. Lastly, be sure to follow SecurityStudio (@studiosecurity) and FRSecure (@FRSecure) for more things we do when we do what we do.

That’s it! Talk to you all again next week!

H is for Holistic

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Despite all the words that could have been chosen for the letter “H”, here it stands for:

Holistic

We use the word “holistic” semi-frequently in our industry, and there are several definitions. The two definitions I like best are both from the Cambridge Dictionary:

dealing with or treating the whole of something or someone and not just a part:

and the second, similar definition:

relating to the whole of something or to the total system instead of just to its parts

So then, a couple questions with respect to “holistic” and “information security”:

  1. What is the “whole” of information security?
  2. Why is the “whole” of information security important?

Let’s figure it out.

What is the “whole” of information security?

Ask an “expert”. Heck, ask ten! See what response(s) you get.

A simple definition of information security would help; however, a significant and often overlooked problem in our industry is that we still haven’t agreed on one. If you don’t believe me, and don’t want to ask an expert, Google “What is information security?“:

  • “the state of being protected against the unauthorized use of information, especially electronic data, or the measures taken to achieve this.“
  • “Information security, sometimes abbreviated to infosec, is a set of practices intended to keep data secure from unauthorized access or…“
  • “Information Security refers to the processes and methodologies which are designed and implemented to protect print, electronic, or any other form of confidential, private and sensitive information or data from unauthorized access, use, misuse, disclosure, destruction, modification, or disruption.“
  • “Information security, sometimes shortened to infosec, is the practice of protecting information by mitigating information risks. It is part of information risk…“
  • “The protection of information and information systems from unauthorized access, use, disclosure, disruption, modification, or destruction in order to provide confidentiality, integrity, and availability.“

These are only the top five results. There are certain similarities; however, there are significant differences too. Only one of the definitions mentions risk, and even then it references “mitigating risks” versus managing them. I won’t dissect all the definitions here, but the point is, we don’t all agree. Just last week, I read an article from one of our industry experts who claimed that information security and cybersecurity are one in the same.

Ugh! This is us.

If we’re not confused enough ourselves, how do you think we’re viewed by people who don’t work in our field? You know, the ones who are ultimately responsible for information security in the organizations they lead?

Many of them, and some of us, believe information security is complex, overwhelming, and confusing. The default reaction for such things?

Ignorance.

Let’s simplify, explain, and fit information security into organized boxes. Maybe this will help. In order to understand the “whole” of information security, we must first know what “information security” is. The definition:

Information security is managing risk to unauthorized disclosure, modification, and destruction of information using administrative, physical, and technical means (or controls).

We can slice and dice this thing into millions of parts, but this will get us into the weeds quickly and back to that overwhelming feeling. A trick that’s worked for me and my clients is to dissect the “whole” of information security, from the top. Start with the goal or purpose of information security and work our way down through to the minutiae.

The purpose of information security is risk management.

Period.

The purpose of information security is NOT compliance and it’s certainly NOT risk elimination (which is impossible). So, start there.

The three high-level functional areas of information security; Administrative, Physical, and Technical means (or controls). Add those next.

Notice the overlap?

Everything is in the context of risk management. Administrative controls govern how we do things, including our handling of physical and technical controls. There has to be overlap between physical and technical controls because it doesn’t matter how well a server is configured when someone steals it.

From here, plug in all the other stuff. Again, fight the urge to dig in the weeds at this point. We can debate details for days (they vary from organization to organization anyway), but this is a good structure for holistic information security.

The most important points for holistic information security are understanding:

  • This is about risk management. (NOTE: Risk mitigation, referenced in one of the cited definitions earlier, is a risk decision as part of risk management. Some risks are completely acceptable as-is, and don’t require mitigation.)
  • Administrative controls rule the others. Computers only do what we tell them to do. Tell them to do bad stuff, and they will. Tell them to be configured poorly, and they will.
  • Information security isn’t an IT issue, clearly.

So, who cares?

Why is the “whole” of information security important?

We can’t fully realize the benefits of information security without understanding and treating the “whole” of information security. We sell ourselves, and the organizations we serve, short. Two important things come to mind almost immediately; we don’t realize the benefits and we don’t live in reality.

Reality

Treating the “whole” of information security better protects us from being blindsided by something we didn’t account for. You’ve probably heard the saying, “your security is only as good as your weakest link“? It’s been said thousands of times by people a lot smarter than me; here’s just a few:

So, then. What is your weakest link?

Treating any one part of information security while neglecting others is poor information security. If you’re fooled into thinking that you’re sufficiently protecting yourself (or your organization) without taking a holistic approach, you’re living with a false sense of security. It’s not reality.

Benefits

Information security has been treated as a cost center since before I started my career in the early 1990s. Sad. Why can’t we use information security to be more efficient, drive more business, and ultimately make more money (assuming this is the purpose of the business)? We can, but it takes a intimate understanding of holistic information security and the organizations we serve.

The short of it; mission (or purpose) alignment is key. Think about it for now, and perhaps we’ll elaborate more when we get to “M”.

Treating the “whole” of information security makes us better consultants to the organizations and leaders we serve. The most common “tell” for an information security leader (CISO or vCISO) who doesn’t understand (or treat) the holistic view of information security is his/her inability or unwillingness to put risk into context. The best CISOs are 1) great leaders and 2) understand risk in context.

Honorable Mention for “H”

Several words could have been chosen for the letter “H”, including:

  • Hacker – a person who can think outside of the box, exploring ways to use things beyond their intended purpose. Some hackers are motivated by curiosity, others by notoriety or money. What motivates a hacker is often deeply personal. Just like most things in life, hacking can be used for good or evil, depending upon the motivation.
  • HAL – an acronym for hardware abstraction layer, but every time I think “HAL”, I think of HAL 9000. HAL 9000 is the fictional artificial intelligence system from 2001: A Space Odyssey. If you haven’t seen this movie, stop reading now. It’s a classic, and you need to watch it.
  • Hardening – making systems (infrastructure, computers, etc.) less penetrable (or less vulnerable), often through configuration. Classic hardening techniques are removing applications that aren’t necessary, removing services that aren’t necessary, strengthening authentication (with MFA or other), etc. Well-known resources for system hardening include CIS Benchmarks and the Security Technical Implementation Guides (or STIGs).
  • Hardware – the stuff you can touch. Assets come in two forms; tangible and intangible. Hardware assets are tangible and are often used to manage intangible assets such as software and data.
  • HITECH – acronym for Health Information Technology for Economic and Clinical Health Act. This regulation was enacted in 2009 as part of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA). HITECH prescribes certain information security requirements and clarifies others (related to HIPAA) for healthcare and related entities.
  • HIPAA – acronym for the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act, enacted in 1996. Prescribes certain information security and privacy requirements for healthcare entities.
  • Heuristic – in simple terms, methods of deriving solutions to problems through learning and experience.
  • Home Area Network (HAN) – the network, and everything connected to it, in your (and my) home.
  • Honeypot – a purposely vulnerable computer system deployed to attract attackers. Honeypots are often deployed as a deception technique and/or to learn about the tactics attackers are using in the wild.
  • Human – You and me. I’ve often said that information security isn’t about information or security as much as it is about people (humans). Humans are the ones who suffer when things go wrong (if we didn’t, then nobody would care), and we are the most significant risk (not the computer).

That does it for “H”, now on to “I”.

Episode 107 Show Notes – Happy Thanksgiving

/in /by

Hey there, it’s time for episode 107 of the UNSECURITY Podcast!

Just when you think you can’t get any busier…

You get busier.

Maybe if I learned to say “no” a little more often. My dilemma is 1) mostly brought on by myself and 2) is a blessing. It’s better to be busy than to have nothing to do, especially when you’re helping people. I’m grateful.

Short introduction today. Too much going on to elaborate much (for now).

On to the show notes…

This is Evan, I’ll lead the discussion today, and these are my notes…

SHOW NOTES – Episode 107

Date: Tuesday November 24th, 2020

Episode 107 Topics

  • Opening
  • Catching Up
    • What’s new?
    • “Information Security @ Home”
  • Happy Thanksgiving
    • What are your grateful for?
    • What’s different this year?
    • What’s the same?
    • Holiday shopping tips for EVERYONE
  • News
  • Wrapping Up – Shout outs
Opening

[Evan] Hey there! Thank you for tuning in to this episode the UNSECURITY Podcast. This is episode 107, the date is November 24th 2020, and I’m your host, Evan Francen. Sadly, Brad won’t be joining me today. He’s out of commission fighting a bout of labyrinthitis. The prognosis is good, so we expect him to be back soon!

So, this means you’re all stuck with me. I’ll do my best to provide some value for your ears and brain.

Quick Catchup

[Evan] The catchup time is a little different without Brad, so I’ll just give you a quick recap of what I’ve been up to.

Topics:

  • 4th quarter is notoriously busy, like VERY busy, for us. Everyone is running at 100% capacity right now, which is good, but also stressful.
  • Security Sh*t Show – this is live on YouTube every week; Thursday nights at 10pm CST.
    • Last week Chris Roberts and I did the Paqui One Chip Challenge online with a couple fans.
    • We also unveiled a new sticker (see below). If you’d like one, just subscribe to the Sh*t Show YouTube channel and let us know.

  • Information security hobbies – I’ve been working on a Raspberry Pi home network security device, including Kismet, pfsense, and Pi-hole. More to come on this next week.
  • Maybe another thing or two.

Transition

Happy Thanksgiving!

[Evan] Originally, Brad and I were going to continue our discussion about information security at home, then I realized that this is Thanksgiving week! Instead of talking about our original topic, I’m going to talk about protecting yourself (and your family) from holiday shopping scams. For many Americans, Friday marks the beginning of the holiday shopping season, and it’s important for all of us to be careful! Lots of things have changed this year, it is 2020, but some things haven’t. The scammers are still scamming, and a most of the scams are the same this year as they’ve been in years past.

Some interesting stats/information:

  • 61% of Americans have already started holiday shopping (before Thanksgiving)
  • 22% of Americans start their holiday shopping on (or after) Thanksgiving
  • 15% of Americans start their holiday shopping in December
  • 2% of Americans start their holiday shopping in January (hopefully for next year)
  • Last year:
    • $730 billion was spent on holiday shopping
    • $135.5 billion was spent holiday shopping online
    • $71.3 billion was spent holiday shopping using a mobile device
  • Online holiday shopping (in terms of dollars spent) is expected to increase by 35.8%

More online shopping coupled with the fact that most of us are more distracted (than ever), means attackers could have a heyday.

Opportunity + Distraction = Success (for scammers)

Tips to protect yourself and your loved ones (we will make this into a checklist soon):

Most important – situational awareness. It’s the umbrella for all other protection activities/behaviors.

  1. Ship to a secure location – avoid shipping to places where merchandise could sit unattended and insecure for long periods.
  2. If you decide to use a mobile app for shopping, use official retailer apps only.
  3. Don’t save payment card (debit or credit) information in any shopping accounts
  4. Using Apple Pay or Google Pay for payments wherever it’s available.
  5. If you’re unfamiliar with a retailer, do your research before buying. Make sure the site and retailer are legitimate.
  6. Don’t rush to purchase at the lowest price. Slow down and think about security risks first.
  7. Never make purchases on public Wi-Fi – Never.
  8. Use a VPN when shopping (or doing anything sensitive) online.
  9. Always use strong passwords and a password manager.
  10. Check security and/or privacy policies, especially for retailers you’re unfamiliar with.
  11. A legitimate retailers will NEVER ask for your Social Security number, so don’t give it out.
  12. Make purchases with credit cards over debit cards.
  13. Make purchases with prepaid debit cards over credit cards or regular debit cards.
  14. Review all your accounts and bank statements regularly. You should be doing this all year.

Please be careful this holiday season. DO NOT let scammers steal ANY of your joy or hope!

Transition

[Evan] Alright. That’s that. On to some news…

News

[Evan] Always plenty of interesting things going on in our industry. Here’s a few stories that caught my attention recently:

Wrapping Up – Shout outs

[Evan] That’s it for episode 107. Gonna give my shout outs…

[Evan] Thank you to all our listeners! Send things to us by email at unsecurity@protonmail.com. If you’re the social type, socialize with us on Twitter, I’m @evanfrancen and Brad’s @BradNigh.

Lastly, be sure to follow SecurityStudio (@studiosecurity) and FRSecure (@FRSecure) for more things we do when we do what we do.

That’s it! Talk to you all again next week!

G is for Governance

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Governance

How does the word “governance” make you feel? In full transparency, the word makes me edgy and disturbed.

I really don’t like the word “governance”.

Maybe you’re a like me, and “governance” gives you a case of the heebie-jeebies. What about this word makes us feel this way?

Two things (for me anyway); I don’t like being told what to do, and bad governance seems more prevalent than good governance. Maybe I’d cringe less if good governance were more common in our industry.

Let’s do three things here; 1) define what governance is, 2) describe bad governance, and 3) show what good governance looks like. If you think information security governance is a waste of your time, you’re wrong!

Governance is critical to every information security program without exception.

If this is true, we’ll need to do some explaining.

What is Governance?

Literally. Merriam-Webster defines “governance” as:

the act or process of governing or overseeing the control and direction of something (such as a country or an organization) 

Further definition, this time using the word “govern”:

  • to exercise continuous sovereign authority over – Sovereign means supreme authority. Authority without accountability can easily lead to despotism, and that’s bad! So, governance without accountability is also bad, really bad.
  • to control the speed of (a machine) especially by automatic means – Could apply figuratively, but this is more like a governor on a motor.
  • to control, direct, or strongly influence the actions and conduct of – This one works I think.
  • to exert a determining or guiding influence in or over – Yeah, even better. I especially like the use of the word “influence” versus manipulation. Different things.
  • to serve as a precedent or deciding principle for – Another definition that fits.

OK, now to apply this knowledge of “governance” to information security.

Bad Governance

Bad information security governance can be more damaging to an organization than no governance at all. Here are some reasons for bad governance:

  • Poor Alignment – Bad governance starts with poor (or no) alignment with the organization’s mission. The mission of the organization defines its purpose and its reason for existence. ALL things done in the business should be aligned with the mission, including information security.
    • If the organization has no mission, it is purposeless and directionless. Best of luck trying to establish information security governance in this organization! You’ll need it.
    • If the organization has a mission, but information security governance is miss-aligned, we’ll run into all sorts of issues. Issues can include lack of business “buy-in”, angry/disgruntled personnel, culture problems, constantly changing direction (without progress), miss-appropriated funds, etc.
    • If you don’t know whether your organization has a mission, go find out! It’s like really important.
  • No Roles and Responsibilities – Start with a simple question, “Who’s ultimately responsible for information security here?” Too many organizations have no answer or a crappy answer to this fundamental question. From there, begin to define all the things that need to be done (responsibilities). Assign responsibilities to people (roles), and you’re on your way to better governance. People don’t inherently know what their role is or what their responsibilities are. Define and enable.
  • No Accountability – Holding people accountable just makes sense. Roles, responsibilities, and rules without accountability are all empty; they’re useless.
  • Poor leadership – Not just business leadership, but information security leadership. We have a lot of CISOs, directors, and managers in this industry, but not enough leaders. Leaders define direction and become people that other people want to follow. Can you think of an information security leader you didn’t want to follow? Don’t be that person.

Governance just for the sake of governance is dangerous. Bad governance is the sort of governance that makes me/us cringe. Ick!

Good Governance

Good governance is attainable, and it’s beautiful.

We already mentioned the key, it’s alignment.

This is where there’s harmony between the business and information security. The purpose of the information security program fits nicely within the organization’s mission, and even drives the mission forward. Management sees the value with information security. They understand how information security is vital to the organization’s mission and not just a cost center. Management champions the cause because they get it.

Information security doesn’t get in the way, it’s part of the way.

Roles and responsibilities are clearly defined, well communicated, and everyone is enabled to do their part. Information security is part of the culture. Accountability isn’t punitive, but empowering. There are incentives for doing good things instead of punishments for making mistakes.

This sort of governance is led by information security leadership who has a vision for information security. The vision clearly benefits the organization as a whole, not just the security team or IT. The vision is clear and people can see how it benefits them personally. They don’t just tolerate information security, they want to be part of it.

Information Security – The Game

Good governance can work like a good board game.

  • Alignment – We play a board game for a reason. We want to have fun, we want to win, we want to socialize, or whatever. It’s an enjoyable experience, and we’re all sitting down at the table together for a reason.
  • Roles and Responsibilities:
    • Management – In a board game, someone defined the rules for playing the game. We need to define the rules for our information security game. Don’t lose track of the purpose (See: Alignment).
    • Information Security Leadership – They helped design the game with business management, so they should be experts on how the game is played. This is also the person who sits down, reads/understands the rules for the game, then helps the players play the game correctly.

Quick Question: In a board game, how many people read the instructions?

Answer: One. One person reads the rules, disseminates the rules to the other players, and instructs people how to play.

Seems logical.

Another Quick Question: Why do we ask everyone to “read and acknowledge” information security policies (in a poorly governed security program)?

Answer: You shouldn’t. It’s bad governance and a bad precedent. Nobody will read your policies!

    • Employees – The players. They’re expected to play the game according to the rules. They understand the importance of the rules, and understand the reason for the game. They may want to win (positive reinforcement), enjoy the experience, or whatever else motivates them.
  • Accountability – As the game is played, it’s played according to the rules. One player isn’t permitted to define his/her own rules or cheat. Accountability is built into the game.

Conclusion

Good governance is critical to the success of all information security programs. The definition of “good” depends upon your organization’s mission, but in all cases it’s supported by alignment, roles and responsibilities, accountability, and leadership.

Basically, three options:

  1. No Governance = Anarchy
  2. Bad Governance = Chaos, waste, loss, false sense of security, mutiny, etc.
  3. Good Governance = Harmony, effectiveness, simplicity, relaxation, calm, value, etc.

You make the choice (assuming you’re empowered to), but I’ll choose option #3 please.

Honorable Mention for “G”

Again, many great suggestions from friends. Here are the honorable mentions for the letter G:

  • Gamification
  • GLB Act or GLBA
  • Governance, Risk And Compliance (GRC) – NOTE: actually three different (but related) things rolled into one; good for selling more stuff.
  • Gray Box Testing
  • Group Policy Object (GPO)

OK, now to figure out what “H” will be…