4.2 Flashcards
Monitoring and visibility is a critical aspect of
hardened security and zero trust initiatives
All types of systems must be monitored including:
- Corporate LAN endpoint devices
- Web, email, productivity, and other application
servers (i.e., SharePoint) - Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP), messaging, and
conferencing services - Databases and storage area networks
- Infrastructure devices
- Customer premises edge
what do Network monitoring tools enhance?
enhance visibility into system health by offering real-time information about various wired, wireless, and
cloud-based components
This suite of tools utilizes two techniques to capture performance
metrics from assorted infrastructure and security devices – both physical and virtual:
*Agent-based monitoring
* Agentless monitoring
Agent-based monitoring
leverages lightweight software, known as a monitoring agent, on the devices or virtual machine to track the uptime and performance
Agentless monitoring
uses special application programming interfaces
(APIs) or integrated code to track the health of the devices
a less intrusive way to
achieve visibility
agent based monitoring example
*A prototypical example of agent-based monitoring is using Simple Network Management Protocol
version 2C and 3 agents on infrastructure devices to send traps and informs to SNMP management
stations
*In cloud computing environments, special agents can be embedded into virtual machine instances
or installed on instantiated virtual servers to perform various system management activities
*slowed system down
Agentless monitoring (info)
*It typically utilizes application-specific APIs and different network protocols (such as SNMP and
Windows Management Interface -WMI) to discern the overall performance of on-site and cloud-based assets, such as servers and applications
* This monitoring method does not involve the overhead of installing, tuning, and updating dedicated or third-party monitoring agents on every component
* This may be considered easier than the traditional agent-based approach
less intrusive
Log aggregation
the process of accumulating,
categorizing, standardizing, and consolidating log
data from across an IT infrastructure to enable and
enhance streamlined log analysis
what happens without Log aggregation?
administrators and
engineers would have to manually organize, deduplicate, and search through log data from various sources to generate meaningful metrics and information
Log aggregation goals
- Replicating log files to a centralized location
- Collecting Syslog, auditd, and other traps
- Supporting automated pipelines and workflows
- Parsing key-value pairs
- Performing more complex transformations such as
multiline log aggregation, tokenization, scrubbing,
or masking sensitive data
alerting
m delivers metrics and alarms
from various tools and systems to admins and
security operators for informational/event
notifications, incident management, and optimization of the wider ecosystem
what do alerting systems help ensure?
that event
responses are quick and efficient so that the odds of overlooked actions are reduced
The Security Content Automation
Protocol (SCAP)
a synthesis of interoperable
specifications derived from community ideas.
Community participation is a great strength for SCAP,
because the security automation community ensures
the broadest possible range of use cases is reflected in
SCAP functionality
compliance more achievable
importance of SCAP
Improves cybersecurity posture
Streamlines vulnerability evaluation
Simplifies compliance
Makes software deployments easy
Boosts cybersecurity collaboration
SCAP specifications
Asset Identification
Asset Reporting Format (ARF)
Common Platform Enumeration (CPE)
Open Vulnerability Assessment Language (OVAL)
Open Checklist Interactive Language (OCIL)
Trust Model for Security Automation Data (TMSAD)
Extensible Configuration Checklist Description Format
(XCCDF)
Software Identification (SWID) Tagging