[568] in Intrusion Detection Systems
Re: Response to the computer criminal's introduction (FLAME WARNING)
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (Chris)
Fri Feb 9 13:55:05 1996
Date: Wed, 7 Feb 1996 16:51:40 -0800 (PST)
From: Chris <chris@bison.RANGE.ORST.EDU>
To: ids@uow.edu.au
In-Reply-To: <9602061143.AA25006@all.net>
Reply-To: ids@uow.edu.au
Ok, this isn't a flame, but is a response.
On Tue, 6 Feb 1996 owner-ids@uow.edu.au wrote:
> I feel that someone must respond to this introduction. If you don't
> like highly inflamatory postings, delete this now without reading it.
>
> > Since i cannot do anymore hacking without facing the risk to
> > go back in jail.. I thought i could use my skills in the
> > computer security community.
>
> It is my opinion that anybody who would hire a computer criminal to work
> on computer security deserves to lose all of their information assets -
> and probably will. It's about as smart as hiring a convicted child sex
> offender to run a daycare center.
>
Many companies employ this practice, actually. It is my understanding
that several government agencies, companies, etc.. employ so called
"criminals" to assist in securing their network, or rather, in finding
holes in a security scheme once they believe they have secured their
network. There are a lot of 'hackers' out there, and most of them do not
get caught. Do you believe that 'hackers' (hacker in this sense meaning
someone who is knowledgable on topics of and related to computer,
telecom, etc... security, using such practice to break into computer
networks and the like) period should not be working with commercial
computer security?
I think many companies realize the value of having the 'enemy' helping
them so that someone who has more harmful intentions does not do them
harm. If you do not employ these people, you are employing people who
learned all that they know from textbooks, manuals, seminars, and
schooling. The edge that a 'hacker' may give could include contacts for
information, an in-depth view of how those that may attempt to enter your
system would get into it, or at least try to get into it, and perhaps
most of all, a 'hacker' would probably have a drive. A curiousity. An
intense desire to find not only bugs in your system that most would use,
but those system flaws that are original and new, that the one harmful
person to your organization might try out.
If someone were hired in a corporate espionage context, chances are the
person would have a well set-up computing platform, all the requisite
software to make the job of hacking easier, and that intense desire to
get in.
After all, securing your network is really just trying to figure out how
others would try to get in. It's amazing how many companies I see that
>secure their networks and don't bother trying to break into them, themselves.
Anyways, this is my two cents and attempt to start up a discussion on the
value of hackers and 'criminals' in securing a network in the
datacom/telecom context.
> > I am also working on an unix intrusion detector based on new
> > concepts.. and will open a computer security company during the
> > year.
>
> Please let us know the name of the company when you start it so we can
> tell all of our clients to avoid it.
You may still be interested in his intrusion detector, even if you didn't
like the company, if the company starts, that is. I don't know him, or
that product or company he is trying to start creating, but from a
security context, I use all the tools at my disposal to secure the
networks that I secure.
> ************** FLAME OFF *****************
>
> -> See: Info-Sec Heaven at URL http://all.net/
> Management Analytics - 216-686-0090 - PO Box 1480, Hudson, OH 44236
-Chris (chris@bison.range.orst.edu)
