IT Security Blog

Tape virtualization guidelines

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mainframes

Greg Schulz of Computerworld shared some guidelines of tape virtualization. Tape virtualization is one of the popular topics when it come to storage. Some of the said advantages of making virtual tape libraries would include improvement of the performance of the back up, archiving and other related processes and smooth transition (from tape-based to disk-based).

Here are the ten points he raised in his article:

1. Integration of VTL in your business continuity, conditions of your site/location.
2. Storage devices to be attached to the VTL.
3. Projected storage capacity needed in the future.
4. Backup, archiving, etc. software supported.
5. Support of differencing or single-instance repository capabilities.
6. Determine if you are looking for a turnkey solution.
7. Resiliency and redundancy needed.
8. Security level needed.
9. Tape device and library emulation for your environment.
10. Necessary changes to your current setup.

The questions he raised in his article really make you consider your needs and the conditions of your system. All these questions will help you evaluate if you would use virtualization. You cannot just decide right away if you will use VTL because it could affect your system in a major way.

It is always good to look at the possibilities before arriving at some decisions like this one. It is best to do a full study before you spend on it. One of the important things you also have to consider would be the people who would be in charge of this project in your company. Who will be the ones in charge of the study and the follow up in case you do push through with it. Your data will be at stake so it is better to be safe than sorry.

Data or Program: Which are you really Safeguarding?

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When it comes to network security, the main focus is to of course protect your IT infrastructure. But if you had a choice, which is really important; the program or the data you have gathered?

At first glance it would have to be the data for sure. Software programs can be easily modified and replaced depending on the requirements of any organization. Database protection is important since without it, companies have no basis for analysis and comparison as far as actual performance and reference for clients stored in the database is concerned. If you had to rate both, it would be data first and software second.

There are other people who put premium on software of course. But this will depend on their contingency plan better known to most IT professionals as backed up or archived data. Normally this is so basic that you don’t need to remind anyone the need to have archived historical data in cases where system crashes or intrusions may occur. There will always be scheduled backups and archiving for any program using entity since these are valued and important as far as linking all transactions and tracing revenue.

But the actual safeguarding of these two IT elements is how you expose it. There are usually policies governing the actual level of exposure such as net presence or the use of external storage devices like CDs and floppy disks. Normally, these are discouraged but knowing people who are hard headed today, some of them still ignore these policies and even get away with it.

MajorGeek.com: A Download Site for Computer Care

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Major Geek

Day-in and Day-out, people surf the web for possible downloads in the form of drivers, security stand alone cleaners, and free programs that will help them in their specific needs. One drawback is the potent threats and reliability of such sites since everyone is aware that such malicious Spyware or Trojans may be present in these programs which are usually compressed in zip files prior to free downloading.

Majorgeeks.com is one site that contains a lot of the helpful tools to aid computer users in their everyday issues and improvements for their overall operating system and performance. One notable thing that most users are aware about is that of intrusions in their system from the usual cookies and attachments that people get from the Internet. With the mischief going around, no one really knows how safe their computer is and what files are needed and not on their hard drives.

Scheduling Software Patch Updates and Upgrades

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Computer Programmer

Most software tools that are used today are not perfect. Weaknesses and loopholes that may encounter system operation conflicts and problems will only be natural, especially for programs that are either not immediately compatible or are prone to breakdowns every now and then. The need for a continuous development as far as applying patches and updates towards such software, such as programming languages and operating systems like Windows and Linux, is a necessity.

This is only normal considering that chinks in the armor of anything will always be revealed at times when people least expect it. This is a continuing and ongoing trend that all software developers and administrators need to attend to, considering that as the height of demand for accurate programs are increasing, the same holds true for the need to provide features and flexibility on the programming aspect of installed systems for smooth flow of automations in most business organizations and entrepreneurial undertakings.

[tags]programmer, patch updates, systems, operating system, windows, linux [/tags]

Back Up Files for Added Security

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At the rate that hackers and more people are becoming wiser as far as discovering technology and its flaws today, the best way is to have ready back-up procedures for databases and important documents and spreadsheets just in case of system intrusion and crashes. While it is true that most companies are continuously developing software to be able to limit such malicious intentions, it cannot be discounted that the safest way is to have ready back-ups which can be easily restored at any time of their liking.

Archiving and Backup Files

The question is when to back-up and what to back up. For most people, backing up periodically is the common practice. But for more important documents and reference materials, archiving them as often as possible is the safest way to be sure. People should not wait for the last minute to back-up their files since with the fast pace of technology comes the fast pace development of hackers today.

[tags]backup,archiving,network security[/tags]

WiFi Protected Access – Why You Need It

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802.11 Wired Equivalent Privacy (WEP) doesn’t provide enough security for most enterprise wireless LAN applications. Because of static key usage, it’s fairly easy to crack WEP with off-the-shelf tools. This motivates IT managers to use stronger dynamic forms of WEP.

The problem to date, however, is that these enhanced security mechanisms are proprietary, making it difficult to support multi-vendor client devices. The 802.11i standard will eventually solve the issues, but it’s not clear when the 802.11 Working Group will ratify the 802.11i standard.

As a result, the Wi-Fi Alliance has taken a bold step forward to expedite the availability of effective standardized wireless LAN security by defining Wi-Fi Protected Access (WPA) while promoting interoperability. With WPA, an environment having many different types of 802.11 radio NICs, such as public hotspots, can benefit from enhanced forms of encryption.
Inside WPA

WPA is actually a snapshot of the current version of 802.11i, which includes Temporal Key Integrity Protocol (TKIP) and 802.1x mechanisms. The combination of these two mechanisms provides dynamic key encryption and mutual authentication, something much needed in WLANs.

As with WEP, TKIP uses the RC4 stream cipher provided by RSA Security to encrypt the frame body and CRC of each 802.11 frame before transmission. The issues with WEP don’t really have much to do with the RC4 encryption algorithm. Instead, the problems primarily relate to key generation and how encryption is implemented.

TKIP adds the following strengths to WEP:

48-bit initialization vectors. WEP produces what’s referred to as a “keyschedule” by concatenating a shared secret key with a randomly-generated 24-bit initialization vector (IV). WEP inputs the resulting keyschedule into a pseudo-random number generator that produces a keystream equal to the length of the 802.11 frame’s payload. With a 24 bit IV, though, WEP eventually uses the same IV for different data packets. In fact, the reoccurrence of IVs with WEP can happen within an hour or so in busy networks. This results in the transmission of frames having encrypted frames that are similar enough for a hacker to collect frames based on the same IV and determine their shared values, leading to the decryption of the 802.11 frames. WPA with TKIP, however, uses 48-bit IVs that significantly reduce IV reuse and the possibility that a hacker will collect a sufficient number of 802.11 frames to crack the encryption.

Per-packet key construction and distribution. WPA automatically generates a new unique encryption key periodically for each client. In fact, WPA uses a unique key for each 802.11 frame. This avoids the same key staying in use for weeks or months as they do with WEP. This is similar to changing the locks on a house each time you leave, making it impossible for someone who happened to make a copy of your key to get in.

Message integrity code. WPA implements the message integrity code (MIC), often referred to as “Michael,” to guard against forgery attacks. WEP appends a 4-byte integrity check value (ICV) to the 802.11 payload. The receiver will calculate the ICV upon reception of the frame to determine whether it matches the one in the frame. If they match, then there is some assurance that there was no tampering. Although WEP encrypts the ICV, a hacker can change bits in the encrypted payload and update the encrypted ICV without being detected by the receiver. WPA solves this problem by calculating an 8-byte MIC that resides just before the ICV.

For authentication, WPA uses a combination of open system and 802.1x authentication. Initially, the wireless client authenticates with the access points, which authorizes the client to send frames to the access point. Next, WPA performs user-level authentication with 802.1x. WPA Interfaces to an authentication server, such as RADIUS or LDAP, in an enterprise environment. WPA is also capable of operating in what’s known as “pre-shared key mode” if no external authentication server is available, such as in homes and small offices.

An issue that WPA does not fix yet is potential denial of service (DoS) attacks. If someone, such as a hacker or disgruntled employee, sends at least two packets each second using an incorrect encryption key, then the access point will kill all user connections for one minute. This is a defense mechanism meant to thwart unauthorized access to the protected side of the network.

You will be able to upgrade existing Wi-Fi-compliant components to use WPA through relatively simple firmware upgrades. As a result, WPA is a good solution for providing enhanced security for the existing installed base of WLAN hardware.

The eventual 802.11i standard will be backward compatible with WPA; however, 802.11i will also include an optional Advanced Encryption Standard (AES) encryption. AES requires coprocessors not found in most access points today, which makes AES more suitable for new WLAN installations.