Network Vulnerabilities and Controls

Network Vulnerabilities and Controls

Computer networks are constantly under threat from many different sources of attacks. In order to get a clear understanding of the different views on computer security and its characteristics, it is important to define a network. This term means a group of computers that have been interconnected to communicate to one another using electrical signals. The network can be either wired or wireless and the most common of them nowadays is the wireless computer network. The internet or wide area network can link very many computers that are widely and geographically apart.

Computers are therefore linked to communicate with one another via the internet. However, these same computers are prone to attacks from all different angles. Any unauthorized access to ones computer can be defined as an attack since in the process, valuable information may be retrieved from the computer or even deleted. The information may be defined as an asset by many scholars and bodies with the international standards organization (2009) defining an attack on the computer which is the asset as any "attempt to destroy, expose, alter, disable, steal or gain unauthorized access to or make unauthorized use of an asset."

These attacks can either come from within or from outside an organization via the internet. Some of the threats that computer systems are vulnerable to range from viruses, spyware, malware, viruses, inception of data identity theft and hacker attacks (cisco.com). In this paper the focus will mainly be on hackers and how they operate.

Hackers defined

Bruce sterling (1993) defined a hacker as "a person who breaks into computers and computer networks for profit, as protest, or sometimes by the motivation of the challenge." Although they term themselves as computer experts, many countries businesses and individuals see the specified hackers as criminals. Some are good others are bad but they all depend on the vulnerability of the computer network to carry out their operations. They all have to get around a system in order to gain access to it. Vulnerability of the computer systems is the rating of the level of insecurity of the said systems and therefore leading to exposure to very big risks.

Hackers use various methods to exploit the weaknesses of the network systems. A weak system will always be prone cyber attacks therefore it is necessary to explore all the possible vulnerabilities of the system. In 2009 the Juniper networks inc. published a paper on "Nuclear Plant Control System Cyber Vulnerabilities and Recommendations toward securing them." They suggested that hackers are motivated by many things including money in order to make a quick buck out of the exploitation of the systems weakness. It is true that a cyber attack can cripple a fully operational plant bringing it to its knees. Any computerized system can be hacked if it is found to be lacking the proper security control measures. Attacks can be on the aviation industry, power generation plants, satellites and many more.

Data interception is the most common threat to the internet since the data that has been intercepted can be used for other harmful means, this occurs when there is a weak link in the network and this is what intruders exploit to achieve their objective. As was in the case of 1999 where a direct threat to the U.S. power stations was witnessed where a computer hacker "publicly announced his intention to release a report outlining how to break into power company networks and shut down the power grids of 30 United States utility companies" (utilities it, 2000). Probably the hacker may have intercepted data that was being transmitted to the different power companies through their systems therefore making them highly susceptible to attacks.

Hackers rely mostly on the information gathered from the internet due to the public availability of the data. The internet has got a lot of information about companies and public utilities you name it, just a quick search in a search engine and the screen will be full of schematics, names of employees and even the system the company uses for its daily operations. (Riptech Inc. 2001). They further state that the information does not only extend to the names of the systems but also "the DNS servers permit, zone transfers providing IP addresses and server names and email information ." (Riptech Inc. 2001. P3). The other suggestion that the company stated would be the insecurities in the network structure. Riptech suggest that poor design in the architecture of the network can lead to weak systems and therefore compromise the security of the system; this will make the system highly vulnerable to infiltration from external sources.

Failure of the system administrators to monitor it on a real time basis may lead to easy penetration by hackers as this is the one in a millionth chance that a hacker may be waiting for in order to strike.

The hacker needs only to go through three basic steps to infiltrate and carry out an attack on a network system. First step is how to gain control of the system network by bypassing all the security measures that are in place against external influences. Secondly after gaining access the process of discovering the details of the system begins and in the process gets to collect the vital information about the specific points in the database. However, the attack can be executed at this stage without the important data but if otherwise, all details about the system are required for a systematic attack. Thirdly after the data has been collected, the hacker can twist the systems process by distributing instructions and commands to the system. This is as according to Mitigations for Security Vulnerabilities Found in Control System Networks by May Permann, John Hammer, Kathy Lee, Ken Rohde (2006).

The However all these may be mitigated by following the set rules and procedures some of which are as defined below.