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        | Internet Deterrent And Automatic Counter Attack
          SystemsCyber defence to punitively deter net perpetrators
          (eg DDOS flood attackers, Intruders, Fraudulent Bank Web Site Criminals,
          etc) |  | Enable Counter Attack
            Capability!
          
          Defence requires robust deterrence:   Laws can't stop global attacks.
 Detect & DETER
 |  Index
      
        
          | http://www.berklix.com/deter/
            : Active Automatic Detect & Deter capability to
            enhance Internet defence,(passive national defence of Internet is
            insufficient).
 USA first developed active Internet deterrent
            capabilities,various countries now have & are getting hostile
            Internet capability.
 Major European countries need to co-operate for
            active deterrence,Government Required:to more effectively deter potential attack, sharing
            development effort.
 
              Not a passive cyber defence study to be spun off
              to a university.A weapon systems development by a company or
              multi- national quango.Operational control needs discipline &
              security (USA Command is military).Operations will require Secretary of State
              permits.Governmental purview of list of co-operating
              national control centres. |  
      To develop technology to enable automatic responses  up to punitive counter attack, To
      Deter Internet Attackers  that launch
      un- provoked security probes, intrusion attempts, &/or
      attacks. 
       
        Internet attacks are increasing
        . A few nations have had counter technologies for years.
        Most developed countries have nothing.Escape crippling assumptions that nothing can be done,
        &/or that anything we might do would be too difficult
        or somehow illegal.Remaining unprotected is too dangerous.Technical capability can & should be
        developed.Governments should fund it, (as
        net services need active protection, not just passive
        defence, & governments & society will probably Not
        want to step aside & let industry & commerce
        control it. )Governments need to clarify or change law to allow operation.Operators must later be selected, licensed, &/or
        authorised, by government agency &/or industry quango
        (quasi autonomous non governmental organisation).First we need to start finance of early development, as
        that will likely take longest to develop.
          This will never be a system or product for end users. 
          
            General public will never have access to run
            active response modules.Home MS PCs will not run this (except possibly
            passive honey pots)Nodes (feeding to & controlled by NOCs) will be installed in Internet data
            centres with substantial net resources.The system will be installed & supervised by
            disciplined organised professionals.
          The page below needs re-shaping. (A Sisyphus
          job, (like painting the Forth
          Bridge) tracking & linking
          for: 
          
            Changing nature of
            attacks.Changing detection
            methodologiesPossible response optionsLegal stances & possible changes in a
            myriad of countries.See Also: Disclaimer. Top of Page
      The General Problem
        Many criminals & other hostiles are attempting
        Internet server intrusion, with more hostile intent than
        foolish `Script
        Kiddies' (who waste valuable administrator time for
        fun).Criminals run Fake Bank
        Sites to defraud. (Some perhaps on other's suborned
        systems, discovered as insecure & invaded by
        criminals). Some system owners won't know, or much care if
        [part of] their system is [perhaps unknowingly] invaded
        & suborned, so as long as they don't notice, others get
        hurt, not them, & it mostly continues to work,
        (Sensible zombie designers probably ensure to not disturb
        the host of their parasite).Here's one example of a
        criminal fraud, that took very little time to analyse,
        & trace back.DDOS flood attacks etc.The problem is world wide, so trying to deal with it
        individually in different European countries is a poor
        solution, better to standardise & share detection detection networks & analysis
        techniques & jointly develop response options, even if not all
        responders use all response
        techniques. The Traditional Soft Headed European Method Fails To
      Deter
        Have a firewall, possibly with dynamic components, eg
        traffic filters, access failure detectors, Denial of
        service (DOS) traffic filters etc.Have an intrusion detection
        system.Log attempted & actual intrusions, & collect
        evidence to maybe much later prosecute with (expensive)
        lawyers.Weeks quicker & cheaper than determining language
        of attacker,Waste time every day, viewing logs bloated with details
        of intrusion attempts that have failed this day, every
        day.If one intrusion attempt catches the eye as
        particularly annoying, hand analyse it (wasting more time)
        write a complaint email (knowing it will probably be ignore
        or bounce, determine recipients language, pay to get it
        translated to whatever, send it maybe half way round the
        world to Asia or somewhere, wait days or weeks for it
        probably to be ignored, unanswered.One day discover one of those many unpunished attempted
        intruders finally succeeded, & now you have Serious
        trouble.See that Law is a failure, a waste
        of time & money & does not protect. Logging Intrusion Attempts
        Good security is of prime importance, but we can't be
        complacent knowing criminals are constantly trying to pick
        our locks every day.Logging is worth while to improve security, justify a
        security budget, or counter attack, not just for
        itself.Logging without use or a response is just a self
        deceiving feel good factor for management &/or
        self.A waste of time = money, if after admins view logs each
        day, intrusion attempts are seen, yawned at, &
        discarded as usual.Many attempts are global, eg from Asia & ex Soviet
        territory etc.Some countries, groups & people will obviously be
        next to impossible to pursue.No more than an occasional snowball's chance in hell of
        sueing & successfully collecting from &/or
        punishing some intruders if caught.Even if you sue an attacker - So What !?It's a well known business ploy of corporate adversaries,
        to waste & delay & distract the time of
        competitor's management, by frivolous law suits, counter
        suits, threats against management individuals, or any other
        distractions to take their eye of the ball, always implicit
        tactics in play, such as ~Our corporate lawyer is bigger
        (& more expensively funded) than yours!~" ... How can
        you be sure the agressor attacking doesn't have a bigger
        lawyer than you can afford ? Or is not operating from a
        regime with tacit approval of attacks, or at least no
        interest in inhibiting attacks.
 Better to respond to an attacker Fast ! Not delay waiting
        for lawyers.
Companies don't need possible financial compensation
        paid years later if by some miracle they sue an intruder
        & receive judgement against intruder & manage to
        avoid going bankrupt in the interim after their secrets are
        stolen or database damaged, & finally bailiffs
        somewhere globally manage to collect cash damages.Companies (& administrator's careers ;-) would
        prefer the damage Not to occur in the first place.For many firms, the extra time off line, sealing
        original attacked media as evidence, & preparing new on
        line duplicates, would be business lost, & bad
        publicity admitting it happened.Cost example: Apparently (in 2005)
        German (or 
         Bavarian ?) police won't even forward an incident worth
        less than 50K Euro to their USA compatriots if incident
        launched from there, as not cost
        effective for less. 
        Even more so for government systems, often damage will
        not easily have a fiscal worth, & no chance of sueing
        & collecting compensation, just a lot of damage after
        intrusion, (& egg on faces ;-). A polite response (reporting to ISPs) usually fails:
        Reporting un- provoked attacks to ISPs (Internet
        Service Providers) often fails to work, even with details,
        eg intrusion
        complaint complete with log.ISPs (& others) often just ignore complaints of
        being attacked by their customers or their users.(Not just ISPs are irresponsible, other net access
        providers too eg: This author's own ex
        university computer lab. (decades after graduation) failed
        to respond to complaint, when author reported one of their
        current students, complete with address of which 3 bedroom
        terraced house student attacked from ! (Yes, reports
        narrowed down to which individual house!))
ISPs usually try to hide behind their Terms Of Service
        (TOS), which are irrelevant excrement to the innocent
        person who was attacked by the ISP's criminal customer.The terms of some contract between net provider &
        attacker, & even local national laws
        in that jurisdiction of provider & attacker, are all No
        Excuse, & Irrelevant to the innocent attacked
        victim.
If ISPs reply, they never report who the miscreant was
        from their site/ customer base, & what _disciplinary_
        action was taken. They merely occasionally remove a
        customer.That is Not punitive discipline. Reporting customer or
        user to the authorities & or public page of dumped
        miscreants could be some discipline.As ISPs never report that as done, a regularly attacked
        victim (& many of us Are attacked every day, consult
        your logs ) may consider himself
        entitled to revenge himself direct, to damage the attacker
        to prevent a repeat attack on self & others, &
        punitively deter other attackers.Some ISPs are truly complacent, criminal accomplices,
        making extra revenue from criminal negligence, by paying
        for insufficient staffing to control their subset of
        criminal users. That under cuts more responsible ISPs.The most criminally complacent ISP most deserve counter attack to coerce them to
        purge their criminal customers. Top of Page Better To Deter!
      
      
        Invest in a deterrent totally automatic co-operative
        response / counter attack system, to flood/ attack/ disable
        attacking hosts & nets, (regardless if `innocent &
        subsumed zombies' or not.Turn back Your problem to be Their Problem - &
        Advertise Your Counter Attack facility prominently as a
        deterrent,When the owners of the hosts the attacks come from,
        finally see it Is their problem too, then they will fix
        Their problem they have been hosting & tolerating until
        now, as it didn't hurt till now, just hurt other innocents,
        eg us.Some attackers will be unattended compromised / cuckoo
        proxies hosts)Some attackers will be irresponsible large sub nets,
        who don't really care until your problem becomes their
        problem, eg Universities, Coffee shops with `Hot spots',
        Drive by bluetooth (`war driving') connections, Lax ISPs
        with dynamic IPs, etc.Where originator can be classified by type, maybe
        different responses may be appropriate, but it's better to
        Respond than continue with. Time to Escalate Response:
        Active automatic defence will work better (eg dynamic
        firewalls).
          Why we need automatic systems not individual manual (or
          even worse, infinitely slow legal) response: 
          
            The industrialised `West' has always been ahead of the
            curve on technology, automating, while other countries
            play catch up deploying cheap mass labour. Just as once
            we ran machines to make clothes while poorer countries
            hand stitched clothes, so today, some poorer countries
            & or some criminals can more easily employ lots of
            people at low rates, to attempt various types of
            internet incursions (eg This author has received those himself too, eg
            the unsolicited phone call from a noisey call centre,
            with Indian accent, "You have a virus, we can remove it
            for you, point your browser at our web site." (to which
            the answer was "Liar!" & phone call
            terminated.)  We cant afford the manpower to
            manually fight all those criminals. We need to Automate
            Internet Defence.
          Hostile counter attack will work yet better still.
        Nothing less will encourage some sites to discipline
        themselves &/or their users.It's time to take action against sites &
        irresponsible ISPs etc who host script kiddies, criminal
        fraudsters, & the negligent who run insecure systems
        suborned by criminals to perpetrate crime. Americans (& Others) Have Deterrence
        The American Government & (Others) Have Systems has
        long been reported as having counter attack capabilities.
        (References to American counter attack test
        networks: DETER
        & EMIST)The rest of the world needs to develop its own
        deterrents, as USA has consistently showed (from
        approx 1982 to 2003), that it is prepared to
        embargo sensitive software source exports, eg crypt.c etc,
        even to close allies such as Britain.The rest of the (non American) world needs to develop
        their own systems to [hopefully] co-operate with American
        systems.Hoping to just beg from the American plate would fail:
        Even if American technologists might be prepared to share
        source code, the USA government is likely to [now or later]
        munitions embargo either code &/or databases.
          We non Americans eg Europeans etc don't get stuff free
          reliably forever by waiting & begging. 
          
            That's why 
            Britain & France
            developed own nuclear weapons technologies through half
            a century,That's why Europe today develops 
            Galileo v. GPS etc:
        Russians have had some capability apparently (strike if
        perhaps not counter strike ?The 
        Chinese Government now has facilities apparently.Being dependant on variant whims of future USA (or
        other) political control is not an option, especially when
        this technology is so comparatively cheap to develop. Time
        we Started ! Top of Page 
      Some problems we will deal with, some we will not, some are
      optional, & some we may co-operate with other
      organisations. 
       Some We Will Deal With
        Which sort of attacks are best & easiest dealt with
        needs ongoing analysis , some
        thoughts: We may have multiple input modules feeding a
        common collator stream (on a distributed net, no single
        point of vulnerability of course) If you have technical
        comments, mail author  or join deter mail list . 
         Detect & analyse for eg: 
          
            DDOS Distributed Denial Of Service
            - Flood Attacks, deliberate overloads. 
            
          PWD & SSH
          Password cracking flood attacks.SMTP
          open relay Spammers running automatic search tools
          seeking open mail relays : 
        How: 
         
          In most cases above, by adding source code to the daemon
          (background process) programs (eg add code to Generic version of bind for DNS on FreeBSD ).
          Initially one could also use autonomous 'tail -f' of
          logs. Case marked (*) by other OS specific measures.
        Some Might Be Appropriate for Co- Operation With
      Others
        Some net abuse could not be easily automaticly detected,
        but could be automatically penalised by optional automatic
        outputs of this project, eg counter attacks on sites
        hosting: 
         
          Originating sites from ssh intruders.Originating (or controlling) bank fraud spam
          traffic.Bank fraud spoof we sites , ( after manual analysis of Phishing spams).
            FTPD write access probes bases 
            
              It's not worth initially including, except
              perhaps as a later module from sensing Honey Pots traps, as real sites that are
              trusted to run Deter software can be assumed to have
              configured their FTPDs sensibly & not be at risk
              from this. 
              ( `Warez' Illegal Bootleggers, (who invade
              un- safeguarded ftp servers & write bootleg
              copyright films/ movies, music, pictures, sometimes
              also with illegal &/or offensive content, beyond
              stolen copyright. The upload often overflows discs
              & causes loss of service to genuine users, &
              wasted time for administrators. The mass parallel
              downloads cause excessive telecoms bills from
              networking providers, & lack of availability /
              performance for genuine users.) )Some We Will Not Deal With
        Other net abuse phenomena, though bad, are not aimed to
        be detected/ responded here for a variety of reasons,
        (eg technical, not real time etc, &/or others
        deal with it, or too political, or too innumerate, hard to
        define, we shouldn't bite off more than we can chew,
        etc.) 
          
            Spammers who flood 
            
              (Be it alphabet flood or from lists, & be it with
              or without viral payload). The reduction/ prevention
              of spam is dealt with efficiently by many others
              already well established, eg 
              
            Excretia dumps in Web Forms: 
            
              Some `Script Kiddies' launch robots that fill
              web forms with rubbish. Web forms detecting this will
              be too variant, too much work for us to provide
              hooks. Some form data collection may be only later be
              human analysed so not appropriate for real time response; data privacy issues,
              commercial firms wont want to give us data, we wont
              want it & do Not want personal data harvesting
              issues, Don't want any personal data (registrar/
              privacy hassles)).
            
            Bootleg (commercial copyright) software & music
            & videos etc.: 
            
              Outside of remit. ( Publisher monopolists get
              little sympathy, they get enough millions, despite free
              software.
            
            Child porn, {Race & religious etc} hates,
            Terrorist, Bomb builder & Criminal site etc 
            
              Outside remit. Dealt with by national police
              & Europol
              etc. Not phenomena appropriate to real time (sub
              second) automatic detection
              & response.
             Top of Page
       
      Direct attacks should be relatively easily to detect &
      trace, eg either by having the attacked domain host one of
      our boxes, or by attacked domain including one of our
      detector IPs in their DNS  etc. 
       Most attacks will probably be from bot nets: PCs probably
      running Microsoft, subverted by viruses, to the command of
      remote botnet controllers. We will need
      some Honey Pots deliberately open to
      sense attack, so we can see where attacks come from) One example of a honey pot: a
      modified ftpd that runs open to write & read (sought by
      Warez script kiddies with smallish initial test files), that
      slowly throttles big uploads after initially allowing it
      fast, that runs traceroute & whois etc during upload,
      & that then either deletes or slows & corrupts those
      downloads to buy more time to attack uploaders, [& maybe
      report downloaders]. Script kiddies will think they've found
      a sucker ftpd but we'vre traced them before they can alert
      most of their clients to download. Top of Page 
      
        
        Our first targets may be larger criminal &/or state
        sponsored brute force attacks against particular
        governmental infrastructure, large organisational or
        corporate/industrial (semi predictable grudge-match)
        targets: The easier identifiable low hanging fruit, that
        attracts press, public, business & political interest
        & funding.Later we will need to also respond to smaller more
        random, less predictable offenders, eg general criminal/
        commercial etc botnet exploiters, that may be harder to
        analyse.We can't limit ourselves to warning or counter-
        attacking just lots of small botnet zombie'd PCs; That'd be
        as effective as swatting mosquitoes, (& a firewall is
        only about as effective as a mosquito net), we need to
        analyse botnet DNA, then toss DTD in their swamp.Cracking Botnets to find who is
        controlling them has a project of its own: Know your Enemy:
        Tracking Botnets - The Honeynet Project.Most Honey Pots based on Microsoft
        OSs (prime target), may (or not) be internal or externally
        configured by co-operating 3rd parties, ie Anti virus
        companies, (the R&D departments of those companies that
        presumably set out their own Honey
        Pots to trap future unknown viruses to document for
        next release of their own virus detection software).Other Honey Pots based on forms of
        Unix (eg Linux, BSD, Solaris etc) could be configured by
        our own internal Unix staff (as Unix core skills are needed
        also for the rest of the project). These will capable of
        deepest monitoring for analysis.There may also be access to 3rd party Honey Pots (by definition they're open to some
        extent anyway, but extreme care would be needed for that,
        not to trigger deadly mutual embraces between counter
        nets), especially with 3rd party Honey
        Pots undeclared to us as Honey
        Pots, & non declaration of some (or many) is
        inevitable).Tracing of active direct attacks is relatively easy,
        same core Unix etc skill sets as above.Tracing of indirect attacks managed by anonymous botnet controllers will be more
        difficult, needs more thought,will need more MS skills than
        Unix skills, (& our project core staff will be largely
        Unix skilled), so we will either need co-operation with
        anti virus companies etc familiar with MS, or need to
        recruit some staff experienced with MS.Public logs of sites that have
        launched un- provoked attacks, could help co-ordinate
        automatic analysis of sites
        appropriate for automatic defence or counter attack; This
        would be just a subset of the info available to trusted
        project members.
          Analysis of some Distributed Denial Of Service (DDOS) tools;(As intruders already have used these tools, we should
          analyse them & also could consider using similar
          techniques for defence by deterrent counter attack.) :
 Top of Page 
        
      
       After detection , comes response :
      Optionally a warning, disabling, counter attack, flood, or
      demolition by legal enforcement, whatever responders find
      appropriate. 
       Types Of Response
        
          People tend to distract to debate what they think might
        be morally & legally appropriate responses not just for
        them, but globally, & for various sorts of incident.
        Such debate is endless & distracts & delays project
        design, so serves none but the ultra pacifist who might
        want to block all action. To avoid distraction into argument, the project will aim
        for a modular approach, modular in detection & modular
        in response, so different response policies are usable for
        each mix of { recipient & responder } & { country
        legal precepts & organisation / agency policy, &
        individual operational chief } & type/ gravity of
        attack detected by initial innocent victim, & intensity
        & timing repeat factors. Responder sub nets can then
        decide configure & change their own response policy,
        not subject to global agreement/ endless dispute. Options For Passive & Active Cyber Defence &
        Response
        These are ideas subject to discussion & refinement,
        & to promote discussion on mail
        list , to show there are ways to respond once the tracing/ analysis  is done, but first we
        need to fund  the design &
        development of detection  & tracing/ analysis  phases. 
         
          For Design Notes see belowStarting with mildest first, for civilian agencies
          operating from pacificist inclined nations) ...Automatic emails to hostmaster@ virus/ zombie'd PC's &/ or abuser hosts,
          basically saying"WARNING We have identified you !, Control your
          user ! Log attached!" see eg README
Increased frequency: They may wake up faster if we
          send 12 then 60 mails an hour. (A colleague of an absent
          administrator may get tired of the "You have new mail"
          audio prompt, & look at screen).Later harsher wordings (including countdown ?) at
          higher frequencies, as imminence of counter measures
          approaches.Flood repeat that mail to their in box till it fills,
          for several reasons: Force attention; Mild punishment;
          Guarantee our warning is seen & not lost among other
          mail.
            Disabling The Network Interface Configuration of botnet - zombies (while leaving other internal
            components intact eg botnet subsumed individuals' files
            & editors etc) : 
            
              Install a README displayed
              at boot.Reboot or (if PC BIOS supports it) halt the zombie PC. (Halt is better as
              people will more likely notice their machine has been
              turned off, gives them more time to get it fixed
              before they need it perhaps urgently.Pass To Human Agencies occasionally to arrange
          raids by police or other law
          enforcement/ at remote site, (if some responder sub nets
          consider that more appropriate for that cluster of
          detector reports)
            Black Lists of: IP numbers & ports
            (Unix/ 
            FreeBSD /etc/services) 
            
              
                Input To Black Lists: 
                 
                
                  As well as trusted members of the deter
                  network contributing directly to database of
                  attackers , also ...Just as organisations such as spamhaus &
                  other RBL providers) generate black lists of spam
                  senders,The honey pot data could
                  be monitored, traced, & noted, for IP numbers
                  of attackers, route relays & attacked target
                  IPs & ports (Unix/ 
                  FreeBSD /etc/services)
                Output: Broadcast of Black Lists (of IPs ( &
                ports (Unix/ 
                FreeBSD /etc/services) ) 
                
                  
                    Those IPs could be fed to dynamic firewalls,
                    direct or via live relay co-operating firewall
                    manufacturers. 
                    
                      Fed via 2 methods: (active sending
                      (encrypted mail?) &/ or passively made
                      available for polled fetching) (ftp?).(We have contacts at one firewall
                      company 
                       to
                      discuss data format possibilities, more
                      contacts welcome, to author
                      or to deter mail
                      list))[Some of] Those IPs [To certain criteria]
                  could be web published for others not yet
                  integrated, (some firewall manufacturers, OS
                  providers (free projects & commercial) &
                  intelligent end user sites.The IPs & ports will also be fed to other
                  trusted nodes in our own internal Deter
                  network.Just like anti spam lists, there's the risk of
              blocking a few innocent with many guilty - but if
              it's that or see your net servers die from DDOS, there's some discretionary level at
              which one may want to automatically enable dynamic
              filtering.
            If/ when we detect zombie botnet controllers, 
            
              Optional human confirmed delay, if R-DNS tools
              suggest attacker is in a friendly country where we
              can arrange Quick response by police or equivalent to
              catch attackers red handed.Otherwise, Automatic Co-ordinated massCounter Attack from our co-operating net
              nodes. Targeting IPs & ports at frequencies
              considered appropriate.
 Flood Attack of packets, mail flood, web overload
          & DNS overload counter DDOS. (Counter flood of compromised equally harmful proxies/
          &/or zombies may be necessary, to alert the upstream
          adjacent carriers, to realise _they_ have a problem
          customer to terminate immediately, & that our problem
          is not theirs to ignore, but theirs to resolve,
          urgently).
 
      Morality
        Consider some analogies :
          An illegally parked vehicle doesn't necessarily get a
          warning to driver or owner before it gets wheel
          clamped.Police in stolen car chases can throw concertina
          lines of claws across the road, to cripple the tires,
          then later contact owner to inform them the vehicle was
          used by criminals, & question owner if vehicle was
          locked before it was stolen. Here's a
          notice could be served on owners of detected &
          disabled zombie PCs.If someone deliberately used a catapult to fire stuff
          at or through through your window, would you feel
          entitled to grab & damage the catapult. Would you
          carefully ask if the user was the owner before you
          snatched it or broke it ?If you saw daily attempts to pick your door lock at
          home, would you be complacent ? wouldn't you worry they'd
          one day get lucky & break in ? If you could see where
          the criminals came from, would tracing the criminals back
          seem sensible ? Or would you just wait for your locks to
          be picked ? Wouldn't deterrence
          seem better ?)Might you install a weak lock on one door (a honey pot), & arm the room with flash
          lights, cheap net cameras, & a silent alarm to the
          police station ? (& perhaps an optional deep hole if
          law allowed ? rather like the optional alternate response modules of this project). 
        If you'd approve some of the above, best urge decision
        takers to fund  some initial
        development of Internet detection 
        & tracing/ analysis  capability;
        then while we are developing you will have plenty of time
        to consider what the dangers are, & decide what optional response modules  you may
        later want to help fund  &/or
        enable / deploy.
       
         Some people knee
        jerk & say doing anything active would be illegal.They probably don't realise: General public will
        never have access to run the active response modules.Maybe legal constraints some places, there's an
        opportunity for those interested more in law to get
        engaged, explaining issues to local politicians, to change
        their local laws while we develop this project, so when
        it's ready for delivery, those places can use it too.If some places can't easily or quickly get their local
        law changed to allow response by
        counter attack, they'll still be able to operate honey pot which will generate data for less
        active responses (eg packet black lists)..The rest of the world won't wait, both attackers & defenders have been developing
        techniques, botnets & counter methods for
        years.Law fails currently: doesn't protect us from incoming
        attacks.In a world where both attackers & attacked could be
        in any of (singular or multiple collections of) 190 nations
        , that's 36100 combinations: hoping local law might defend us is ridiculous. Especially as
        most attackers may well be be in other states, some may be
        in rogue states, failed states, ineffectively controlled
        states, terrorist tolerant states, states with a more
        tolerant view or benefiting from piracy, or cross border
        criminal bands &/or groups of anarchists, or companies/
        groups / religions / whatever attacking rivals, etc.Laws (in some jurisdictions) prevent counter attack to
        deter/ penalise attackers, especially by civilian groups, -
        a problem to rectify.Laws in aggregate can not protect, more hinder from
        responding to attacks.Different response modules
        will be available, so different people / organisations in
        different jurisdictions can respond with differing methods
        & intensities, (Choice of response modules Also avoids
        a distracting fruitless debate for consensus on uniform
        appropriate intensity, frequency, & type of response).Court cases would take years, at vast expense, to fail
        to deter a minute percentage of attacks.Automatic counter attack deterrents could be issued
        effectively in seconds ... As quick as a child learns not
        to poke a wasp again !
  
        Countries & peoples/ sectors will present a spectrum of
        early & late adopters, some background: 
         
          Australia - CSOC - Cyber
          Security Operations Centre "... to pro-actively
          and reactively respond to cyber threats".
            Britain Canada: WSJ 
          October 17, 2012, additional 155 million Canadian dollars
          (US$158 million) over five years ("The U.K., for
          instance, said last year it will put an extra £650
          million ($1.05 billion) into cyber security over five
          years. In 2008, the U.S. began its Comprehensive National
          Cyber security Initiative, under which it plans to plow
          more than $10 billion into cyber defense, ... the U.S.
          and U.K. see more clearly that the cyber threat is an
          offensive." 
          
            France  
            Germany   
              
                Web refs found at 2013-05-18: 
                
              A German state prosecutor once opined active
              counter attack wouldn't be feasible to operate [for
              civilian / corporate use] [without a change of law] -
              but discussion did not include for operation by
              government &/or military (different laws
              presumably for military).Plenty of time to change laws if necessary while
              development proceeds in parallel.
                Some civilians don't like the idea: 
                
                  Some don't realise or ask: Who will have
                  access to the response
                  modules, & under what disciplined procedures
                  for use.Some don't realise the normal public will
                  Never have access to NOC
                  Databases that will control response modules.Some tend to be rather myopic & shocked,
                  partly 'cos the seriousness of attacks &
                  necessary defence solutions are all fairly
                  new.Some seem to prefer to remain unaware that
                  criminals busily use the Internet as an
                  international free fire zone, & national laws
                  do Not hinder attackers, laws just hinder
                  defenders; Once people acknowledge that reality,
                  it's hard to continue to put off the decision:
                  Accept continued constant attack forever more,
                  & not defend ? Or equip to analyse &
                  repulse attacks, & change restrictive laws
                  ?Near all forget that all the German policeman
                  they pass on the street have guns on hip. 
                   ).Shock comes from change of perspective, eg:
                  (this British author was also shocked when
                  he first encountered armed guards in normal
                  civilian Munich offices in 1985. 
                  Germans are so used to lethal weapons
                  regularly in close proximity they're just part of
                  the landscape, it doesn't shock them, yet the
                  thought of remotely disabling a remotely
                  attacking zombie PC or server, disturbs "Rechts-staat"
                  (aka "politically correct") mentality of some
                  civilians.Some Nay sayers could usefully re-
                  analyse their perspectives & pre-conceptions
                  & think more logically, less reactionary knee
                  jerking ;-).Parts of the German military have
              expressed interest Some countries may prefer to place their
              NOC Command & Control under
              military or police discipline rather than staff it
              with an authorised civilian Quango (Quasi
              Autonomous Non Governmental
              Organisation).Operational staffing decisions should not be
              allowed to delay development. Development needs to be
              funded now. There will be a
              couple of years to develop, during which operational
              staffing & policies can be debated. Attacks regularly are in the
              newsEuropean Union.
            
            Perhaps it will be easier funded,
            & operated under eg a co-operation of multi
            national European military or quasi military/ police
            government units.
          Top of Page 
      
           If you are a government or EU agency, company,
        organisation, or perhaps with budget to help sponsor this,
        or later that might help pay for some Internet Intruder
        detection, passive &/or active
        defence, optionally with active deterrent counter attack
        systems, services, &/or consultancy , Vector Systems Ltd & associates would be pleased to
        discuss ideas free of charge, please feel free to make
        contact.Yes, we have ideas of what it will cost. It depends on
        various factors, Contact us to
        discussJoin the deter mail
        list, to show interest, & keep track, if you are a
        programmer interested to develop, Or a system or net
        administrator interested to later perhaps use, Or a manager
        who may later have a budget for purchase of licences/
        donations/ or funding consultants employees or students to
        help develop the technology.If funding is insufficient, to encourage it, (or
        possibly for security reasons) we might need to restrict source repository read access so
        that funders nominate who gets access to newer code, &
        public access is only to older code.To avoid the possibility of some funders (nations or
        organisations) waiting till others alone have funded the
        development:The founding nations etc who initially fund the
        development, will be given the keys to form an initial net
        of NOC Command & Control
        Databases
 Other nations/ operators who later seek to join the NOC net may be required by those who
        already paid to be in the NOC net to
        make a contribution to past & perhaps ongoing further
        development costs, before the international net of NOCs
        will accept incident & response records from the newcomer NOC.
        (Not foolproof, but encouragement to help fund the moderate
        costs now to get started, & not all wait for each other
        to contribute funds
  Top of Page 
      
        Currently we have just one mail list:deter@ To discuss how best to design automatic
        counter attack technologies.Join the
        deter@ Mail List
          Later the list may be split into sub lists, eg : 
          
            deter-announce@ moderated to ensure
            low traffic, Announcements of funding, affiliations, calls for staff,
            releases available, operational status
            changes.deter-dev@ for developers to discuss
            source codedeter-users@ a self help mutual
            assistance group for users of the code & service.
            Users will be experienced server
            administrators.deter-finance@ to arrange funding of central service portions of the
            projectdeter-law@ to discuss how to get
            politicians to modify obstructive laws. Top of Page 
      The name IDACAS (for
      international page of Internet Deterrent
      And Automatic Counter Attack System) may acoustically
      remind one of the Greek name Icarus, who
      ignored warning & flew too near the sun & melted his
      wings. The similarity is somewhat apposite: There are dangers
      & responsibilities to neither over react, nor under react
      to attacks. 
      Currently nearly all countries are asleep at the
      wheel, not reacting. `Hackers And Crackers : There's A
    Difference !
      `Hacker ':
      An Ignorant Name, used by technicly incompetent press,
      politicians & clueless management; 
       `Cracker ':
      The Correct Name used by skilled computer
      consultants . 
       Mislabelling Hackers & Crackers Displays
      Ignorance
      The label `Hacker' is mostly wrongly used, a useful indicator
      the user is probably ignorant (& that their opinions are
      worth less & sometimes worthless ;-). Most journalists
      & politicians mis-lead the public, mis-using the word
      Hacker, exhibiting their ignorance   Learn the difference ! 
       `Hackers' Examples: 
       
        
          Programmers who efficiently hack up (ie generate/ improve
          / adapt) existing source code in minimum time, (much
          quicker than commercial programmers with proprietary
          sources who have to start from scratch), usually to give
          away Free eg 
          
            
            Mail archive of a hackers group, from March 2003
            on, for the FreeBSD.org  free
            operating system:, No evil Crackers there !, just
            innocent Hackers improving free software to give away.
            Called Hackers long before ignorant journalists &
            politicians mis-understood & hi-jacked the term
            Hacker & mis-lead the public. The FreeBSD
            Foundation is listed as a public charity by the USA
            IRS, read its web to see what it does.Journalists - long known as Hacks - hack up articles,
        sometimes from pre-existent pre-supplied text eg press
        releases etc. (Hacking of text ... akin to hacking
        of program sources ) - How come journalists are so clueless
        they don't understand the similarity ?)Hacks are
        general purpose non specialist horses, Hacking is a form of
        riding. 
      `Cracker ' is the much better pejorative to apply to
      criminal Internet system intruders & vandals etc. ...
      "Cracker" as in "Safe Cracker "
      etc ! 
       Some Crackers mis-appropriate the name Hackers, but that
      only fools the ignorant. A thief may call himself a fund
      manager or investment manager or banker, doesn't mean you
      have to believe him either, nor assume all of them are
      criminals. Similarly most Hackers are not criminals.
       Use the right word: Cracker not Hacker .
    
 
      
        The aim is to co-operate with lists & tools for
        active dynamic defence & / or counter attack. Preference is to initially develop on BSD (even nicer
        than Linux), to work with tools compatible with the
        extensive ports
        collection of FreeBSD.Using code extensively security reviewed. Based on open
        free co-operative international standards 
        
         (not proprietary commercial pseudo standards attempting to
        monopolise the market).Particularly ports/net.html
        & ports/security.html
        There is no question of basing these systems on Microsoft
        proprietary binary, un-sourced, virus compatible OS's
        (though some honey pot will use
        MS.)Later porting anything necessary later to NetBSD (If multiple platforms
        are needed. - But most design will be for
        supplemental cheap BSD boxes to be connected to other
        heterogenous Unix servers, so we won't need full native run
        support on all Unixes direct); &/or OpenBSD (if security features
        there appeal above other BSDs at assessment time).Systems envisaged to be based on standard cheap PC
        Server hardware bases, linked to existing major
        organisations gateways.Later it can be ported to other Unixes eg Linux if need
        be, but note: The software will NOT need to, or be allowed,
        or trusted to, run on normal end user PCs, it will only run
        on resilient hardware in server environments, next to
        gateways & routers, accessible only to some net
        administrators. There is no need, & No intention to
        port or run it on any OS such as Microsoft, that does not
        provide OS public source code.Flood deterrence by counter flood is dangerous will
        need careful design, management & discipline, not to
        spill over to other similar systems, recurse within itself,
        or mutually deadlock, etc.(Variable escalation criteria dependent on time zones,
        work days, public holidays, root national domains, if
        targeting offender direct, or escalation alert levels for
        innocent but possibly lethargic neighbouring carrier
        etc.)
We may pre compile lists of R-DNS
        & routings etc, in background during normal peaceful
        times, (like search engines use web crawlers, but we would
        only store IPs & routes (not text) for internal
        reference (no external public enquiry load), so a minute
        fraction of the load of search providers). We would keep
        this in reserve, patched to our DNS etc, for when our own
        DNS & other deter services were inevitably
        attacked.  The previous point
        raises questions of DNS & BGP protocol services &
        resilience of existing services that have been addressed in
        other forums for some time, eg 
        here in French 
        ,
        & how those service might be secured more, other bodies
        are looking at that, we will aim to track/ co-operate with
        that.Security: Some work proposed may require people to sign
        to eg: the British official secrets act, or German or
        French equivalents, eg:French
        Agence nationale de la sécurité des
        systèmes d'information requires :
        noter : ces postes nécessitant
        d'accéder à des informations relevant du
        secret de la défense nationale, le titulaire fera
        l'objet d'une procédure d'habilitation, au niveau
        Secret Défense.
DNSSEC & amp; IPSEC etc will probably be needed internally
        on the project, they are tools to help build the projected
        solution, they are not tools that as of themselves would be
        obviate the project. 
         
      Format subject to change: 
       "|" separated fields (not normal Unix convention of ":" eg
      for tbl, as dates use ":".
       Column Order 
        DATE[s] of attack (TZ=CET or CEST, ie GMT+01:00
        or GMT+02:00 in summer). There may have been numerous
        attack before & since. A minimum of one date is noted.
        This column is first to ensure a sort will recreate
        chronological log order.Number Of Attacker
          DNS Address of Attacker OK or a
          Lie ?Whether via nslookup, after using RARP to match the IP#
          to name, the name then maps back full circle to IP
          number, as it should.
 Possible Values: (In sequential test &
          possible result order)
 
            
              | Key | Explanation | Conclusion | Action Possible |  
              | "!RARP" | R-ARP Fails: No DNS record
              maps number to name. | Secretive | Counter attack. |  
              | "!FARP" | Forward Lookup fails (Inverse of R-ARP Fails): No
              DNS record maps name to number.
              (Even if number to name succeeds). | Secretive | Counter attack. |  
              | "!A" | A Fails: No DNS record maps
              resultant name back to a number. | Liar | Counter attack. |  
              | "False" | R-ARP & then DNS A-Name
              don't agree. | Liar | Counter attack. |  
              | "Match" | DNS R-ARP & subsequent A
              records match, (even if A rec might be a cluster of
              IP numbers) | Perhaps a properly & honestly configured IP,
              with rogue user(s) | Warn First. | NAMEParent IP Domain Name of abuse@ owner of
        domain (may well not be the same as the IP number of the
        attacking host, eg attacking host
        chopok.fns.uniba.sk gets mapped to owner
        uniba.sk )
          REPLY Response if any. 
          
            
              | "Fixed+Detail" | They fixed their problem, ie purged their
              customer or their customer server purged the user
              account etc. They appear to be an innocent provider
              doing their best to responsibly purge miscreants.
              They should Not be counter attacked. They are merely
              listed here to show what (small) percentage of
              providers take such responsible policing action. |  
              | "Auto" | Automatic standard email reply |  
              | "NS" | Not Sent: The results of nslookup &/ or
              http:// access made the domain too suspicious to
              complain to. |  Top of Page
      An initial source code repository will be provided,
      probably initially on Berklix servers; probably using
      Subversion, a set
      of 
      SVN tools now standardly used on FreeBSD.Access to this repository will be discussed with funders before policy is firmly decided.Our starting point is, most nation states are too small
      to operate a Deter/Idacas system alone, so will have to
      co-operate, & for that we need common standards
      developed, eg for incident report
      records, so it is proposed source code of the project
      will be open to all to read & comment on,Yes, public read access means rogues will be able to read
      our code too; inevitable, the normal price to be paid to
      allow a lot more reviewers to check & report potential
      loopholes, & to contribute fixes & enhancements to
      source code. The old "security by obscurity" paradigm used by
      proprietary for-profit companies has long been abandoned on
      international public secure software projects.Of course only a subset of developers will have commit
      privileges to write to the source code repository. 
      The source repository will be
      replicated/ mirrored on multiple (*) servers in Europe
      (etc?), to achieve immunity to disruption from any
      nationalist &/or ignorant politicians eg USA in
      particular who might want to again disrupt international
      developer co-cooperation, (as USA government did with
      Crypt.c
      & Munitions laws between about 1982 & 2003, (despite
      the fact their then enemy already long had Crypt code, &
      ignorant USA government was just pointlessly annoying
      innocent friendly 3rd parties).Multiple servers in different countries so that no one
      country's laws can disrupt the project. We will need
      encryption technologies etc. What we produce may be argued to
      come under purview of USA style munitions laws. Ignorant
      politicians in various countries from time to time consider
      the only valid users for encryption are the state &
      criminals. (Ridiculous) It is recalled France at one time had
      laws restricting encryption (current status Here);
      other countries have considered similar, USA had the clipper
      chip, they wanted to force on others 'cos it was CIA (or
      other) cracked already), - So we'll insulate ourselves from
      individual daft politicians by having a distributed
      base.If some country passes too restrictive law, & that country happens to be the master
      of the mirrored repositories, other operators of other source
      repositories in other countries will simply cease mirroring
      the old master, & designate a new master repository.
      (Akin to & extending from situation when FreeBSD
      insulated itself from daft USA politicians by having
      cryptography developed internationally, but Not repository
      mastered in USA, but in South Africa, so it was only ever
      imported into USA, never exported from USA, & daft USA
      law was thus not breached. Top of Page 
      
        A distributed command & control database (not a source
        code repository) will be hosted elsewhere on several
        replicated/ dual-redundant sites ( to make the service more
        secure from attack). 
        
          This will be a high security system it will contain
          records of past & current attacks & counter response etc.It will be designed as a co-operative secure net,
          with no central master node (both to make it more secure
          from attack, & to avoid nations distracting to debate
          which one might best be ceded control of a singular
          master.Probably each country fronting development funding (which will be cheap) will probably
          also want to fund its own national
          NOC (Network Operating Centre), th e design will allow
          for distributed co-operative functioning.The various national government's funding agencies will later (perhaps towards
          end of development) inform us who are to be the operators
          for their country, so initial sets of security keys can
          be exchanged & documented in the database. 
      Extra Disclaimer: Content of links
      may or may not be agreed with, but may have pointers to
      technology, laws, disputes, etc. 
       
        www.freebsd.org/ports/security.html
        Extra System security software that run on top of Freebsdwww.freebsd.org/ports/net.html
        Extra Networking utilities that run on top of Freebsdwww.imsec.ch/act/hack/hackerletter.html
        "An Open Letter to A Hacker: Dear
        Intruder, Hacker, Cracker, or
        whatever you like to call yourself"
          
          FreeBSD ddos_scan/pkg-descr :- 
          
            Scans for distributed denial of service (DDOS ) agents. eg "trinoo", "TFN" and
            "stacheldraht".
          
        Search engine to case of Abbott V. Act Up Paris, which may
        have pointers to French lawNo_Date, Seen 2013-04-06 : Logo: German Federal
        Ministry of Education & Research A German Test Net -
        german-lab.de - pages In EnglishDNS: Domain
        Name ServiceDNSSEC: 
        Domain Name System Security Extensions"a set of extensions to DNS which provide to DNS clients
        (resolvers) origin authentication of DNS data,
        authenticated denial of existence, and data integrity, but
        not availability or confidentiality"
IPsec: IPsec = Internet
        Protocol Security"protocol suite for securing Internet Protocol (IP)
        communications by authenticating and encrypting each IP
        packet"
bgp: Border
        Gateway Protocol
          DDOS: 
          
        
          Honey Pots: 
          
        Zombies: 
        https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zombie_%28computer_science%29No_Date, Seen 2013-04-06 : Logo: German Federal
        Ministry of Education & Research A German Test Net -
        german-lab.de - pages In EnglishTop of Page Top of Page 
      More legal verbiage may be necessary here later, but when
      reading this page, writing tools, or reading the list, etc
      note: 
       
        Re. Un-provoked Attackers
        ListNew entries to the Un-provoked
        Attackers List may be innocent, they may just not have
        had time to track & kill their rogue user account &
        report back yet.Some hosts may be innocent, just having DNS entries screwed, or in transition.Some sites may be innocent, just having guilty host
        computer(s).Some hosts may have been for innocent purposes, but
        been cracked & compromised.Some administrators may be innocent, but clueless or
        incompetent.Some hosts may be largely innocent, but with one or
        more guilty users.Recipient (of attack & investigating ISPs return
        mail) may have been away & not received response
        yet.Occasional mail failure may occur.IP spoofing etc exists.Use your own detective skills, including comparing this
        list to other intrusion lists, to decide yourself which
        sites merit counter attack.No guarantee all intrusion attempts will be logged.
        (Some recipients of un- provoked attack may not want that).
        Others may qualify for immediate defence or hostile counter
        attack etc, particularly repeat offenders.The Disclaimer on the side
        bar also applies.Counter attacking is doubtless illegal in some
        jurisdictions. Especially where politicians haven't woken
        up to the fact the Internet has no national boundaries,
        & local laws do Not protect their
        citizens & state infrastructure, local laws often just
        hinder defence by deterrence.Where counter attack would be illegal, don't do it, But
        do consider pushing to get local laws changed, &
        perhaps also help develop the technologies in parallel
        while the politicians take their time changing their local
        national laws.It's Your responsibility to comply with Your laws,
        wherever you are on planet Earth.Author & others hereby disclaim everything in &
        out of sight & & any & all inference etc.Use your common sense ! Determine yourself what's
        moral, legal, technically feasible, reasonably or likely
        safe, unsafe etc. Top of PageSee Also: |  |