From Zero to DA using ‘PetitPotam’

Introduction

Whilst I was on ‘holiday’ (seriously even when on holiday I almost always must do some work!) a few Windows vulnerabilities were published. Great work by Gilles Lionel, Benjamin Delpy and many many others!

Lab Setup

A Domain Controller
A Separate ADCS Install with Web Enrolment or two DCs one with ADCS installed.
A windows Client Device (non-domain joined)
An attacker device (I used Kali)

You do not need any domain credentials to conduct this exploit chain, so from a network adjacent unauthenticated position you can get DA with the right circumstances (default configuration). Read more “From Zero to DA using ‘PetitPotam’” →

Defense

Changing a security posture requires changing your own behaviours

I’m sure you will have had a marketing firm or some random sales person on Linkedin tell you that security should be simple and that their product will save you from all the ATPs and nation state hax0rs under the sun. However let’s get real, thats almost certainly not true and also security isnt simple or we’d all be out of jobs and everyon woulndn’t be getting owned all the time.

Getting real

Defense

Ransomware Realities

Everything is much worse now, or is it?

”The world is burning, the world is burning but then if you look around, it always has been…”

Computer systems and security go together much like chalk and cheese! Probably sounds a bit odd but miniaturization, consumerization and mobility have put more technology out in the world than we can really comprehend, yet technology security is still dramatically overlooked by most organizations.

The insane pace of change, the drive for faster, better, cheaper and the reality that it probably isn’t a stretch to say most people (and organizations) do not really understand what ‘secure’ or ‘hardened’ looks like.

Defense

Confessions of a white hat hacker

We move around in many places, we sit in plain sight, you might know we are there, or you might not. We work in the shadows, yet we shine a light. You see we’ve been inside your networks; we’ve sat in your cabs, we’ve worked with your teams. We have read you annual reports and we’ve mapped your company; we do this in a way that often you can’t even see.

Defense

Ransomware Defence: Part 2a – Persistence, Privilege Escalation and…

Recap

In Part 1 (Initial Access Defence and Checklist) we looked at ways of hardening your attack surface to defend against initial access. When it comes to ransomware there is a range of elements and variables in the kill chain that need to be successful for the outcomes to be achieved by the criminals. Here we are going to move further into the kill chain to look at further defences. Remember you need to have an “Assume Breach” mindset if you are going to be able to defend against ransomware, that being said, there is a hell of a lot of things you can do for 0 to low investment costs that provide a great ROI. Now some of this is going to be repeated guidance from part 1, that’s ok repetition is good (make sure you are covered from multiple perspectives). Ok let us get to it! Read more “Ransomware Defence: Part 2a – Persistence, Privilege Escalation and Lateral Movement” →

Defense

My MSBlaster Story

We looked after about 3-3500 endpoint devices. We were running Windows servers/clients and we leveraged technologies such as:

Dameware Tools
Remote Desktop Protocol
GFI LanGuard
RCP/SMB/WMI
McAfee Antivirus

Defense

Ransomware Defence Checklist – Part 1 : Initial Access

Defending the Realm

We keep seeing organization get hit, in some kind of a sick way I think me and some of my friends in the industry are bored with the over dramatic responses of “sophisticated” “advanced” and “unpreventable” because most times the kill chains simply are not like this. But still the onslaught keeps coming. Well I know this much, whilst I would love to deploy with the team and harden everyone’s networks that simply isn’t possible. So what we thought we would do is write something to try and spread the knowledge a bit further and hopefully have some positive impact.

Ransomware 101

It’s not just that your data will be encrypted, it will likely be exfiltrated and sold. You will likely have access sold, data sold and be extorted. The Ransomware business model is adapting to defender responses. Even if you can restore from backup they will likely try and attempt to extort. This brings a key point in this equation, the best position is to NOT get pwn3d to start with. Ok that might sound silly to say but when we look at these kill chains you might start to see the world from my perspective a little. Read more “Ransomware Defence Checklist – Part 1 : Initial Access” →

Defense

Cyber Security Assesments for Normal People

Ok so you might think I’m mad with the title but bear with me!

So, the world is in an interesting place, we’ve got a pandemic, we’ve got prolific cyber crime and we have all kinds of different views on how we should tackle this problem.

Now I love a framework and there’s ton’s of them. But the truth is they are complex, detailed, nuanced and generally require a level of nerd that a lot of organistaions do not have.

In 2020 during the pandemic I decided to try and write something to simplify this position, whilst I didn’t want to be too narrow, I wanted to try and capture the breadth of cyber security that is relevent to the general purpose organistaion. I came up with a set of 140 questions which I believe are a good take on things to consider and ask when conducting a security review at a high level. (yes 140 questions is a high level view, this stuff is complex as hell at the detailed end of things, and the devil is in the detail).

Breach

Following a Kill Chain – Defending against Babuk group’s…

Washington Police Department Pwn3d by Ransomware Group Babuk

So it’s all over the news outlets, a police department (Washington DC PD) has been hit by a ransomware syndicate, Babuk. So firstly, let’s be realistic everyone can get pwn3d and at this time our thoughts go out to those affected and to the teams working the response. Being hit by ransomware is NOT fun and not something we would wish upon anyone. That being said this isn’t an ambulance chase, what I want to do hear is look at the TTPs from Babuk in a bit more detail so hopefully we can help inform and educate people so they can strengthen their security postures.

References

https://news.sky.com/story/russian-hackers-target-washington-dc-police-department-in-apparent-ransomware-attack-12288183

https://www.theregister.com/2021/04/27/washington_dc_police_ransomware/ Read more “Following a Kill Chain – Defending against Babuk group’s TTPs” →

Leadership

A Small Measure of Cyber Peace

The still of cyberspace

The alert queue is empty, the estate is patched, the whirr of fans hums in the background. In marketing everyone wants to be excited and to talk about the next big thing. Whilst the physical and digital worlds move at breakneck speed, there’s sometimes the opportunity to be still, to have no incidents to respond to, to have no major changes. These times can be rare, but they are also needed.

Often when I look at and use cyber maturity frameworks there is a lot of focus on cyber capabilities rather than business capabilities that are cyber enabled. What do I mean by cyber enabled? Well, you see, the way I view this game is that much like the roads serve no purpose if they are not travelled, cyber security capabilities are similar. What organisations should be looking for in my view is cyber enablement of the business rather than security as a separate domain. Integrating customer experiences with technology in a secure manner and adding value are often areas I see people not focus on. It’s a similar story with service management, the focus can be on the activity rather than the business outcomes that are enabled by digital services.