CH06 Hardening Flashcards
What is Hardening ?
Act of configuring an operating system securely by updating it, creating rules and policies to govern it, and removing unnecessary applications and services. It is a process of securing a system by reducing the surface of vulnerability, which is larger when a system performs more functions
What is SCCM ?
SCCM = Microsoft’s System Center Configuration Management
allows admins to manage large amount of software across the network, as well as push out new configurations and policy updates to all the PC’s
What is Application Whitelist ?
Only applications that are on the list are allowed to be run by the operating system while all other applications are blocked
What is Application Blacklist ?
Any application placed on the list will be prevented from running while all others will be permitted to run
What is TOS ?
TOS = Trusted Operating System
An operating system that meets the requirements set forth by government and has multilevel security
▪ Windows 7 (and newer)
▪ Mac OS X 10.6 (and newer)
▪ FreeBSD (TrustedBSD)
▪ Red Hat Enterprise Server
What are patches?
A single problem-fixing piece of software for an operating system or application
Same as Hotfix
What are the OS Categories of Updates?
▪ Security Update - Software code that is issued for a product-specific security-related vulnerability
▪ Critical Update - Software code for a specific problem addressing a critical, non-security bug in the software
▪ Service Pack - A tested, cumulative grouping of patches, hotfixes, security updates, critical updates, and possibly some feature or design changes
▪ Windows Update - Recommended update to fix a noncritical problem that users have found, as well as to provide additional features or capabilities
▪ Driver Update - Updated device driver to fix a security issue or add a feature to a supported piece of hardware
What is GPO ?
GPO = Group Policy objectives.
GPOs aid in the hardening of the operating system
What are the possible file system types ?
▪ NTFS - (New Technology File System). a default file system format for Windows and is more secure because it supports logging, encryption, larger partition sizes, and larger file sizes than FAT32
▪ FAT32 - used by Windows
▪ ext4 - used by Linux
▪ HFS+ - used by old macOS
▪ APFS - used by OSX
What are 5 things that you can do to postpone hard driver failure and ease recovery ?
- Remove temporary files by using disk Cleanup.
- Periodic system file checks
- Defragment your disk drive.
- Back up your data
- Use and practice restoration techniques
