IT Security Services

Software Security - Attack

1. VSFTPD forks a new process to handle each client connection. It could have, instead, spawned a thread within the main process to handle each connection, as is done in many servers.IT Security Services How would this alternative design compare to the original

• It would be less secure because a compromise by a malicious client in one thread could (more easily) access data used by another client's thread, since they share the same address space

 

2. Which of the following vulnerabilities can VSFTPD's secure string library help protect against?

• Integer overflow
• Buffer overflow

3. Encrypting a password database is an example of what category of design principle

• It is an example of defense in depth

4. Promoting privacy is a goal that follows from which category of secure design principle

• It is an example of trusting with reluctance because promoting privacy means sharing private information with as few software components as possible, meaning that fewer need to be trusted to protect the information

5. Suppose you are implementing an extensible data management system. You want to accommodate plug-ins that can implement storage rules and query processing functionality for different data formats (e.g., relational data, object data, XML data, etc.). Which of the following designs most takes security into account?

• The plug-ins are implemented as separate OS processes; these processes communicate to/from the main process to handle queries/updates for the data formats they support

6. Suppose you are implementing a graphical user interface for interacting with an implementation of the RSA cryptosystem, and you want to give users a way to generate new keys. Which of the following designs most takes security into account?

• Allow the user to use a slider to choose the number of bits, setting slider initially to point at 2048 bits. As the user moves the slider to larger or smaller values, visualize the difference in relative protective power, e.g., using a meter.