[Dailydave] "I hunt Sys-Admins"

Wed Jul 13 16:10:06 EDT 2016

Just want to chime in with this bit from politico this morning:

http://www.politico.com/tipsheets/morning-cybersecurity

*DEFINING DIGITAL ACTS OF WAR* *— *Rep. Will Hurd fears ambiguity on
international norms for acts of war in cyberspace could fuel escalation and
deeper economic losses for the United States. So his House Oversight
Information Technology Subcommittee is *holding*
<https://oversight.house.gov/hearing/digital-acts-of-war-evolving-the-cybersecurity-conversation/>
 a hearing today with leading cybersecurity officials at the State
Department, Defense Department and the Office of the Director of National
Intelligence to figure out what to do about it.

Story Continued Below

*“Historically — during the Cold War, for instance — we knew* and the
Soviets knew that if you engaged in ‘X’ activity, then you were going to
get ‘Y’ response,” Hurd is expected to say in his prepared opening
statement. “We do not have similar clarity and understanding — formal or
informal — when it comes to cyberspace.”

*But Hurd could get some contrary opinions from the administration *about
that parallel. Christopher Painter, cybersecurity coordinator at State,
will tell the panel: “It is worth emphasizing that a determination whether
specific events constitute an actual or imminent armed attack sufficient to
trigger a state’s inherent right of self-defense is necessarily a
case-by-case, fact-specific inquiry,” according to written testimony. “This
is the case whether the events occur in cyberspace or elsewhere. As a
general matter, states have not sought to define precisely (or state
conclusively) what situations would constitute armed attacks in other
domains, and there is no reason cyberspace should be different.”

*Sean Kanuck, the ODNI’s national intelligence officer for cyber issues,* will
also offer that “fixation on defining the precise threshold for a digital
act of war (beyond the de facto effects-based analysis to be applied in any
actual scenario) distracts from the important question of how cyber
operations are actually being used today.” The panel is also scheduled to
hear additional testimony from Aaron Hughes, deputy assistant secretary for
cyber policy at the Defense Department; former NSA chief Keith Alexander;
and Peter Singer, a strategist at New America.

-dave

On Wed, Jul 13, 2016 at 2:21 PM Mara Tam <marasawr at gmail.com> wrote:

> 1. ‘Critical infrastructure’ is contextually dependent. It encompasses the
> physical and non-physical systems and services whose damage, interruption,
> or destruction would deleteriously impact national or economic security,
> public health, or public safety. Because these systems and services are
> defined as critical by the consequences of their absence, one can expect a
> degree of variation from one society to another. That does not make the
> concept itself ridiculous.
>
> 2. The problems Dave identifies as unique to cyber are not. Real (i.e.
> binding / non-rhetorical) red lines are rare, and they are rare because
> they require extraordinary consensus and commitment to standards of
> behaviour which can be (more-or-less) objectively specified. This was
> difficult in the 19th century, it was difficult in the 20th century, and it
> is still difficult now. Avoiding, preventing the escalation of, and ending
> conflict are all hard; we are not a special snowflake this time.
>
> 3. Nuclear deterrence comparisons are thankfully on the decline,[1] but
> just because cyber is not analogous to nuclear does not mean it is without
> implications for nuclear. Topic for another day.
>
> -Mara
> _____
> [1] If you’ve not, ready this excellent piece from the Bulletin of the
> Atomic Scientists on why cyber needs to get off nuclear's lawn.
> http://thebulletin.org/flawed-analogy-between-nuclear-and-cyber-deterrence9179
>
> On 12 Jul 2016, at 17:24, Dave Aitel <dave.aitel at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> I wrote a slightly longer piece on this today here:
> http://cybersecpolitics.blogspot.com/2016/07/when-is-cyber-attack-act-of-war.html
>
> But to address the CERT question directly, I will pose a few distinct
> arguments as to how Cyber is a special snowflake and CERTS are clearly
> legitimate targets.
>
> First, the things I've read coming out of the UN/Tallinn have made few
> inroads into defining the difference between CNE and CNA. From an espionage
> standpoint, CERTS are clear high priority targets because they collect
> information on your attacks, but also on other nation states who have been
> caught, which can be fed directly into your national intrusion response.
>
> Likewise, while it is annoying to have your CERT non-functional, a CNA
> attack on a CERT is not life-ending or otherwise special in any way - I'm
> not privy to whatever discussion at the UN/Tallinn drove them to the
> conclusion that a CERT was something special in the response fabric - one
> could as well label "Amazon AWS" as off limits. As much as I love the
> people on our CERTs, we have duplicate response effort in many different
> agencies (in particular, DHS/NSA/FBI/CIA/DOD). No sane country is going to
> take CNE against CERTs off the plate.
>
> If what you're saying is: There are some places you should not attack, I
> would point out that the translation into cyber world is "There are some
> effects on systems you should try not to have". For example: "Trojan
> anything you want, but don't actually damage the dam system near NY because
> we will respond to that as it could cause massive loss of life and clean
> water".
>
> The thing that makes Cyber special here is that there is no end to the
> thread when you pull on it - there is no red line you can draw around a
> hospital or dam system.
>
> -dave
>
> On Tue, Jul 12, 2016 at 3:04 PM Alex Grigsby <AGrigsby at cfr.org> wrote:
>
>> I agree with most of the points you raise (esp. with respect to the
>> vagueness of "critical infrastructure") but I'll push back a bit on your
>> CERT point.
>>
>> You're right that a CERT would likely be a prime target during a
>> conflict, but just because a country would want to pwn a CERT doesn't
>> necessarily mean that it should. Over the last 100+ years, countries have
>> agreed to not deliberately target certain installations in wartime even if
>> it's in their strategic interest to do so. For example, the laws of war
>> prohibit the targeting hospitals or anything with a red cross/red crescent (
>> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Protective_sign) even if it would be
>> militarily advantageous for a country to do so (i.e. less enemies on the
>> battlefield). Same thing goes for restrictions on certain weapons (e.g.
>> chemical weapons in the case of the Geneva protocol or booby traps in the
>> case of the Conventional Weapons convention).
>>
>> Countries have agreed to these restrictions largely on the basis of
>> reciprocity--we won't do it to you if you don't do it to us. It doesn't
>> necessarily mean that all states will comply, but they create a strong norm
>> in favor of their adherence.
>>
>> Based on the history of the laws of war, it doesn't seem completely
>> ridiculous that countries could eventually come to some sort of
>> understanding that CERTs are off limits.
>>
>> Alex
>>
>> -----Original Message-----
>> From: dailydave-bounces at lists.immunityinc.com [mailto:
>> dailydave-bounces at lists.immunityinc.com] On Behalf Of
>> dailydave-request at lists.immunityinc.com
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>> Subject: Dailydave Digest, Vol 56, Issue 1
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>> Today's Topics:
>>
>>    1. "I hunt Sys-Admins" (dave aitel)
>>
>>
>> ----------------------------------------------------------------------
>>
>> Message: 1
>> Date: Mon, 11 Jul 2016 15:15:12 -0400
>> From: dave aitel <dave at immunityinc.com>
>> To: "dailydave at lists.immunityinc.com"
>>         <dailydave at lists.immunityinc.com>
>> Subject: [Dailydave] "I hunt Sys-Admins"
>> Message-ID: <5fc94935-e035-6b70-5d55-7f16d7f25992 at immunityinc.com>
>> Content-Type: text/plain; charset="utf-8"
>>
>> Occasionally I like to reflect, as you all do, on the various things that
>> have mis-shaped our understanding of cyber war.
>>
>> For example, take this Intercept article based on the Snowden leaks:
>>
>> https://theintercept.com/2014/03/20/inside-nsa-secret-efforts-hunt-hack-system-administrators/
>>
>> Viewed in hindsight, this article points very closely at something I'm
>> going to support in depth in an article coming out shortly, which is that
>> *the term "Critical Infrastructure" does not apply in cyber the way defense
>> strategists think it does*. I mention this, which may seem obvious to the
>> readership of this list, because if you read policy papers they go on an on
>> about how nations should avoid "attacking" each others "critical
>> infrastructure" as a "norm". They don't, of course, consider defining a lot
>> of terms in any specificity, but they do mention that under no
>> circumstances should CERTs be attacked. Which clearly is ridiculous because
>> in cyberwar the CERT is something you will have penetrated first so you
>> know when you've been caught everywhere else.
>> Likewise, CERTs are usually very easy to attack. Likewise, top on your
>> list is secure at microsoft.com, and every other security contact. And in
>> order to claim those things as "off limits" we have to declare huge swaths
>> of infrastructure (often unknown ahead of time) as off limits.
>>
>> Also visible in retrospect is that people love to focus on the catchy
>> phrases. "I hunt sys-admins". Sure you do! But that means your strategic
>> offensive efforts have already failed at least twice. In order to get to
>> the point where "I hunt sys-admins" team is involved, you have to get
>> through "I hunt developers", "I hunt other hackers", and "I hunt system
>> integrators". And even above them is "I hunt standards developers and
>> cryptographers" (aka, NIST :) ).
>>
>> -dave
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
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