In January the FBI & Fordham Univ. ICCS 2012 conference was held at Fordham Univ.  It was a great conference with more than 30 countries represented.  Most of the speakers were excellent.  This was truly a great collaboration between private industry and law enforcement from all over the world.

I was somewhat apprehensive about speaking on my topic, “Hacking Back In Self-Defense: Is It Legal; Should It Be?,” since I was not sure how it would be received, especially by law enforcement.  To my surprise the response was excellent.  First impression from many when they read the title is that all hack back is illegal, vigilantism, unethical; but, after the lecture numerous people to include many law enforcement personnel approached me to express their interest in the topic and were happy to see an attorney trying to push the envelope and move the discussion forward.

Let’s face it, here in the US the cyber laws have not kept pace with the technology and now we find ourselves inadequately prepared to defend our networks and information primarily due to our antiquated cyber laws.  I am a proponent of updating our laws but in doing so, finding the proper mix of privacy protection and enabling clear and robust defense.

Hacking-back, or aggressive cyber defense should be incorporated but with parameters and acknowledgement, by those seeking this alternative, that they are strictly liable for their actions and are prepared to make amends to innocent third parties caught in the crossfire.  Obviously this is a simplification of a mission or operation that must consider many many variables and factors, to include legal issues from a multitude of jurisdictions, numerous options regarding the particular options to pursue, evidence of a clear attempt to identify the attacker through various forms of traceback, a memo outlining all of the actions pursued or contemplated prior to seeking hackback along with an analysis of why those actions either failed or were not viable options, and a very robust risk assessment weighing all of the options and comparing the amount of  damage presently being sustained by the company because of the attacks with the potential for damage to others.  These and many more factors must be considered and analyzed when building a case for and a plan to implement hackback.

Here’s some hopeful news from Bill Gates. Viral illness is in decline thanks to his focused attention and heaps of money spent on the reduction of suffering.

…the Microsoft founder has become the people’s plutocrat. Although some diseases, such as malaria, remain rife, his charitable foundation and his lobbying have borne results. In the past year, not a single citizen in India contracted polio.

“People think aid is abstract and thousands of miles away. I go there and see it. I’m intent on making sure that my money gets to people who need it, and I come back and say it’s working.”

Hey Bill, what about all those people using your operating system that need your help to reduce their viruses?

Unlike polio, it looks like users in India seem to have a problem with Microsoft Windows infections, according to the Microsoft Worldwide Threat Assessment.

What would he do if malware infections of Windows systems raised the cost of the distribution or management of anti-virus aid? Ironic, no?

Note the infection rate explosion in France, Russia and Italy over the first half of 2011.

The Crucial Security Forensics Blog lists reasons why the VMware Virtual Disk Development Kit (VDDK) might be useful for a forensics investigation that needs to mount and manipulate VMDK files.

Some scenarios might include master boot record infection such as the Stoned bootkit. The Stoned bootkit is a Windows bootkit, which attacks all Windows versions from 2000 up to 7. It is loaded before Windows starts and is memory resident.

Another scenario involves the malware inserting itself into all VMDK files on the system.

Thirdly, having offline access to the VMDK would be essential if the malware was able to steal essential files such as the system and software hives, SAM and/or private keys.

Fourth, if the virtualized disk were using full disk encryption, the analyst would be able to access the files via the VDDK API without decryption taking place.

Lastly, if the machine had other controls in place such as AV or host-based firewall protection on certain files, an analyst would have access to them and not require booting up the virtual disk.

Differences in interpretation of the EU’s 1995 data protection rules may soon be resolved, according to a proposal by Viviane Reding, Vice-President of the EC in charge of Justice, Fundamental Rights and Citizenship

A single set of European rules on data protection valid everywhere across the European Union, so one rule for the 27 Member States and for the 500 millions people. One data protection authority for one company: a one stop shop and one authorisation for the whole European Union. This will reduce administrative burden and will save the businesses around 2.3 billions Euros a year.

The new rules carry some interesting concepts such as a new burden of proof for companies to retain personal information. Reding advocates for the ability of a person to request that their data be deleted (“right to be forgotten”) unless a company can prove a “legitimate reason” for retention. She also has said companies will have to report a breach “as soon as possible,” which has been suggested to mean 24 hours. Compliance is expected to be managed by a data-protection officer that will be required at all companies by more than 250 employees.