As founder and CEO of Security Weekly, Paul remains one of the world’s foremost experts on all things cybersecurity. Security Weekly is a one-stop resource for podcasts, webcasts and other content, informing community members about penetration testing, vulnerability analysis, ethical hacking and embedded device testing. Previously, Paul served as a lead IT security specialist for Brown University, and as an instructor with The SANS Institute.
Welcome to the Tenable Network Security Podcast - Episode 63
Hosts: Paul Asadoorian, Product Evangelist & Carlos Perez, Lead Vulnerability Research Engineer
Announcements
Several new blog posts have been published this week, including:
Microsoft Patch Tuesday Roundup - December 2010 - "Bad Santa" Edition
Check out our video channel on YouTube that contains the latest Nessus and SecurityCenter 4 tutorials, including the new 3D Tool Beta.
We're hiring! - Visit the Tenable web site for more information about open positions.
You can subscribe to the Tenable Network Security Podcast on iTunes!
Tenable Tweets - You can find us on Twitter at http://twitter.com/tenablesecurity where we make various announcements, provide Nessus plugin statistics and more!
Attackers have been very naughty, IT departments have been mostly nice and Microsoft has fulfilled the role of “Bad Santa”. This holiday season, Microsoft has filled your stockings with 17 security bulletins fixing 40 vulnerabilities. But where does that leave us?
What Else Could You Say?
Note: The word "could" appears in the title of all 17 security bulletins this month
I could say a lot of things about this month's Microsoft Patch Tuesday release. I could say that you should apply patches (except that my boss hates the word “should”). I could say that despite all of the patches released, there are still most likely to be 0-day exploits for several unpublished vulnerabilities. I could also say that your organization needs a solid patch management program. I could say, well, you get the point. After more than a year of writing up each one of the Microsoft Security bulletins, there's a lot I could say. The fact remains that several trends continue in the Microsoft "Black Tuesday" madness:
Welcome to the Tenable Network Security Podcast - Episode 62
Hosts: Paul Asadoorian, Product Evangelist
Announcements
Several new blog posts have been published this week, including:
Using Nessus For Host Discovery
If an exploit falls in the forest, does anyone hear it being patched?
Don't forget to sign up for Advanced SIEM Webinar Series - November through December
Be certain to check out our video channel on YouTube that contains the latest Nessus and SecurityCenter 4 tutorials, including the new Nessus Perimeter scanning service.
We're hiring! - Visit the web site for more information about open positions.
You can subscribe to the Tenable Network Security Podcast on iTunes!
Tenable Tweets - You can find us on Twitter at http://twitter.com/tenablesecurity where we make various announcements, provide Nessus plugin statistics and more!
A Nessus user recently contacted me about performing a scan that would simply discover hosts on the network. This is a very low impact scan that does not look for vulnerabilities or enumerate ports. There are a few good reasons to run this type of scan:
Systems protected by a network or host-based firewall may only respond on a single port or to an ICMP echo request. Hosts that only respond to an ICMP ping will not show up in the default Nessus scan report. By enumerating these hosts you can include them in the report to show that scans were attempted but did not find any results, then determine if this is normal behavior or not.
Your internal policies may provide specific time windows when vulnerability scanning can occur. By tuning a scan that only discovers live hosts, you can check that your Nessus server is set up properly, collect a list of hosts to scan and stay within your vulnerability scanning policy guidelines.
To configure a scan that will only test if hosts are alive, use the following policy settings:
Click for larger image
Welcome to the Tenable Network Security Podcast - Episode 61
Hosts: Paul Asadoorian, Product Evangelist & Kelly Todd, Compliance Analyst
Announcements
Don't forget to sign up for Advanced SIEM Webinar Series - November through December
Be certain to check out our video channel on YouTube that contains the latest Nessus and SecurityCenter 4 tutorials, including the new Nessus Perimeter scanning service.
We're hiring! - Visit the web site for more information about open positions.
You can subscribe to the Tenable Network Security Podcast on iTunes!
Tenable Tweets - You can find us on Twitter at http://twitter.com/tenablesecurity where we make various announcements, provide Nessus plugin statistics and more!
Default vs. Easily Guessable Credentials
There are several Nessus plugins that test various common username and password combinations. I tend to put these into three different categories:
Default Credentials - Known usernames and/or passwords associated with a specific device or application. (E.g. Linksys WRT54G username "admin" password "admin")
Common Credentials - Commonly used username and/or passwords that are valid regardless of the application or device type (e.g. username "root" / password "toor")
Brute Force Guessing - User supplied list of accounts and passwords fed to Nessus via Hydra
There are 70 plugins beginning with "account_*" that try to login via telnet and/or SSH. These plugins test for generic common credentials or credentials that are known to be associated with a particular device or application.
Targeting Credentials
If you want to specifically target credentials you can use the Nessus GUI to create a custom policy to perform a very specific scan. This is a great policy to schedule on a weekly or daily basis as it is low impact (essentially just uses the login functionality of the targets) and will find critical vulnerabilities.
Welcome to the Tenable Network Security Podcast - Episode 59
Hosts: Paul Asadoorian, Product Evangelist & Kelly Todd, Compliance Analyst
Special Guest: Carlos Perez, Lead Vulnerability Research Engineer
Announcements
Don't forget to sign up for Advanced SIEM Webinar Series - November through December
Be certain to check out our video channel on YouTube that contains the latest Nessus and SecurityCenter 4 tutorials.
We're hiring! - Visit the web site for more information about open positions.
You can subscribe to the Tenable Network Security Podcast on iTunes!
Tenable Tweets - You can find us on Twitter at http://twitter.com/tenablesecurity where we make various announcements, provide Nessus plugin statistics and more!
Welcome to the Tenable Network Security Podcast - Episode 58
Hosts: Paul Asadoorian, Product Evangelist & Kelly Todd, Compliance Analyst
Announcements
Several new blog posts have been published this week, including:
Advanced SIEM Webinar Series - November through December
Nessus 4.4 Introduction Webinar - November 17th 1:00PM EST
Nessus 4.4.0 Released!
Microsoft Patch Tuesday Roundup - November 2010 - "Stuck In The Mud" Edition
Advanced Web Application Scanning Using Nessus Video
Be certain to check out our video channel on YouTube that contains the latest Nessus and SecurityCenter 4 tutorials.
We're hiring! - Visit the web site for more information about open positions.
You can subscribe to the Tenable Network Security Podcast on iTunes!
Tenable Tweets - You can find us on Twitter at http://twitter.com/tenablesecurity where we make various announcements, provide Nessus plugin statistics and more!
Enjoy full access to a modern, cloud-based vulnerability management platform that enables you to see and track all of your assets with unmatched accuracy.
Your Tenable Vulnerability Management trial also includes Tenable Web App Scanning.
Tenable Vulnerability Management
Enjoy full access to a modern, cloud-based vulnerability management platform that enables you to see and track all of your assets with unmatched accuracy. Purchase your annual subscription today.
Enjoy full access to a modern, cloud-based vulnerability management platform that enables you to see and track all of your assets with unmatched accuracy.
Your Tenable Vulnerability Management trial also includes Tenable Web App Scanning.
Tenable Vulnerability Management
Enjoy full access to a modern, cloud-based vulnerability management platform that enables you to see and track all of your assets with unmatched accuracy. Purchase your annual subscription today.
Enjoy full access to a modern, cloud-based vulnerability management platform that enables you to see and track all of your assets with unmatched accuracy.
Your Tenable Vulnerability Management trial also includes Tenable Web App Scanning.
Tenable Vulnerability Management
Enjoy full access to a modern, cloud-based vulnerability management platform that enables you to see and track all of your assets with unmatched accuracy. Purchase your annual subscription today.
Enjoy full access to our latest web application scanning offering designed for modern applications as part of the Tenable One Exposure Management platform. Safely scan your entire online portfolio for vulnerabilities with a high degree of accuracy without heavy manual effort or disruption to critical web applications. Sign up now.
Your Tenable Web App Scanning trial also includes Tenable Vulnerability Management.
Buy Tenable Web App Scanning
Enjoy full access to a modern, cloud-based vulnerability management platform that enables you to see and track all of your assets with unmatched accuracy. Purchase your annual subscription today.
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