A VIRTUAL HONEYPOT FRAMEWORK Author Niels Provos Publication

A VIRTUAL HONEYPOT FRAMEWORK Author : Niels Provos Publication: Usenix Security Symposium 2004. Presenter: Hiral Chhaya for CAP 6103

SECURITY SITUATION We’re unable to make secure computer systems or even measure their security. New vulnerabilities kept being exploited Exploit automation and massive global scanning for vulnerabilities to compromise computer systems We use “Honeypot” as one way to get early warnings of new vulnerabilities

INTRODUCTION What Is Honeypot ? ? Defunation--A honeypot is an information system resource whose value lies in unauthorized or illicit use of that resource. Has no production value; Used for monitoring, detecting and analyzing attacks Does not solve a specific problem Honeypots have a low false positive rate

CLASSIFICATION By level of interaction High Low By Implementation Virtual Physical

WHAT IS HONEYD Honeyd: Honeyd A virtual honeypot application, which allows us to create thousands of IP addresses with virtual machines and corresponding network services.

WHAT CAN HONEYD DO ? ? ? Simulate TCP and UDP services Support ICMP Handle multiple IP addresses simultaneously Simulate arbitrary network topologies Support topologically dispersed address spaces Support network tunneling for load sharing

HONEYD DESIGN Receiving Network Data Architecture Personality Routing Logging Engine Topology

RECEIVING NETWORK DATA Ways for Honeyd to receives traffic for its virtual honeypots Special route lead data to honeyd host Proxy ARP for honeypots

ARCHITECTURE • Configuration database • Central packet dispatcher • Protocol handles • Personality engine • Option routing component

PERSONALITY ENGIN To fool fingerprinting tools Uses fingerprint databases by Nmap, for TCP, UDP Xprobe, for ICMP Introduces changes to the headers of every outgoing packet before sent to the network

ROUTING TOPOLOGY Simulates virtual network topologies; Some honeypots are also configured as routers Latency and loss rate for each edge is configured; Support network tunneling and traffic redirection;

HOW TO CONFIGURE Each virtual honeypot is configured with a template. Commands: Creates a new template Set: Assign personality (fingerprint database) to a template Specify default behavior of network protocols Add: Specify available services Block: All packets dropped Reset: All ports closed by default Open: All ports open by default Proxy: Used for connection forwarding Bind: Assign template to specific IP address

LOGGING Honeyd supports several ways of logging network activity. Honeyd creat connection logs to report attempted and completed connections for all protocols. Honeyd NIDS. can be runs in conjunction with a

APPLICATIONS n Network decoys n Spam Prevention

CONCLUSION Honeyd has many advantages over NIDS Collects more useful information Detects vulnerabilities not yet understood Less likely leads to high false positives Cheats the fingerprint tools Effective network decoys Detecting and immunizing new worms Spam prevention

WEAKNESSES Limit interaction only at network level Not simulate the whole OS Adversaries never gain full access to systems Limited number of simulated services and protocols What if the warm is smart to cheat us? Honeyd will become attackers.

HOW TO IMPROVE Combine Honeyd with high-interaction virtual honeypots using User Mode Linux or VMware to have a better forensic analysis of the attacker; Cheat more fingerprint tools, eg. P 0 f—passive analyze the network traffic; Simulate more services and protocols, eg. has a better TCP state machine.

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