Patent Document

BACKGROUND 
       [0001]    Computer networks are ubiquitous, particularly in enterprise and industrial contexts. For example, industrial control systems monitor and control the operation of machinery, such as wind turbines, gas turbines, compressors, motors, generators, and other devices. Interconnection of these and other computer networks facilitates sharing of information therebetween, but increases the threat of cyber attacks. 
         [0002]    Honeynets, Honeypots and honeyports have been employed to address this threat. These systems are used to create fake, or dummy, services which appear legitimate to attackers. Honeynets, Honeyports and/or honeypots may cause an attacker to make additional pivots in a system, stay connected longer, and be more likely to identify themselves or their motives. Honeyports employ server socket listeners which expose fake services in order to entice port scanners to connect thereto, and report when a connection has been established. A honeypot may comprise a partial or full system (e.g., decoy servers or systems) which gathers information regarding the tactics and/or identity of a network intruder. The threat information received by a honey system (e.g. honeyports/pots/nets) facilitates the detection of, investigation of and response to attacks. 
         [0003]    However, deployment of honeyports/pots/nets in production environments is typically not feasible due to the high level of overhead required to maintain them. Additionally, an attacker could potentially use the honeyports/pots/nets to gain access to the target network. 
     
    
     
       BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS 
         [0004]      FIG. 1  is a block diagram of a system architecture according to some embodiments. 
           [0005]      FIG. 2  is an information flow diagram according to some embodiments. 
           [0006]      FIG. 3  is a flow diagram according to some embodiments. 
           [0007]      FIG. 4  is an outward view of a user interface according to some embodiments. 
           [0008]      FIG. 5  illustrates a network architecture of a system according to some embodiments. 
           [0009]      FIG. 6  is a block diagram of a computing apparatus according to some embodiments. 
       
    
    
     DESCRIPTION 
       [0010]    Some embodiments relate to systems to facilitate network reconnaissance, attacker isolation and acquisition of threat intelligence. By analyzing data provided by cyber sensors and by a network&#39;s installed security information and event management (SIEM) solution, some embodiments leverage a continuous, automatic, and/or operator-assisted feedback mechanism. This may provide a dynamically-changing environment for collecting attribution data and behavior analysis data, and for addressing detected threats. 
         [0011]      FIG. 1  represents a logical architecture according to some embodiments. Other implementations may include more or different components arranged in other manners. 
         [0012]    Honeycomb  100  includes analysis engine  102 , active defense engine  103 , honeypot/honeynet  104 , orchestrator  105  and Intrusion Detection System (IDS)/IPS Intrusion Prevention System (IPS) rule generator  106 . Analysis engine  102  may provide offline deep analysis of detected malware/and/or other threats. Active defense engine  103  provides honeyports (to be described in detail below), false targets with call backs with DLP strings, and analytics/trigger points. These analytics/trigger points may enable full packet capture and file capture (i.e., tied to false targets and analysis engine  102 ) according to some embodiments. 
         [0013]    Honeypots/honeynets  104  are known in the art and described in the present Background. Orchestrator  105  consists of virtual cyber sensors which are tied to a cyber sensor repository, also to be described below. A cyber sensor as described herein may comprise a processing system which detects specified network activity (e.g., events, traffic). Also, the set of activities (i.e., attributes) to be detected by a cyber sensor may also be referred to as a cyber sensor. Orchestrator  105  may build, manage, configure and deploy cyber sensors within honeycomb  100 , and may provide a wizard for doing so. 
         [0014]    IDS/IPS rule generator  106  builds and tests signatures and rules for threat detection. For example, third-party systems may use these signatures and rules to monitor network traffic and issue an alert if a signature is detected and/or conditions of a rule are met. 
         [0015]    Honeycomb  100  communicates with traditional SIEM system  110  which, as is known, receives information from IDS/IPS log feeds  120 , honeyport/pot/net cluster  130  and from network components  140 , in the form of traps, alerts and logs generated thereby. 
         [0016]    Honeycomb  100  also provides UI  150  for accessing information generated by honeycomb  100  and for managing the components therein. As will be described below, UI  150  may provide maps (e.g., satellite, road, or terrain maps, plant maps, logical &amp; physical network maps) indicating locations of all active connections and the logical activities occurring over those connections. 
         [0017]      FIG. 2  is a detailed diagram of honeycomb  100  showing operational flow according to some embodiments. Operation of honeycomb  100  may be initiated by an attack vector or reconnaissance activities originating at either Honeyports  210 , Honeydevice  220 , Honeynet  230  of an industrial control system, or by input derived from SIEM  110 . Honeyports  210 , Honeydevice  220 , Honeynet  230  comprise various combinations of a computer, data, or a network site that appear to be part of a computer network, but are actually isolated and monitored, and which also appear to contain information or a resource of value to attackers. Active defense engine  103  coordinates event detection based on intelligence/alerts received from Honeyports  210 , Honeydevice  220 , Honeynet  230 , and/or from SIEM  110 . Generally, active defense engine  103  classifies detected events and determines an appropriate response. 
         [0018]    A response may simply consist of issuing an alert and no other response. In other examples, the event is sent to system repository  240 . At system repository  240 , it may be confirmed that a threat is detected (e.g., based on a policy or rule violation or by utilizing offline malware/threat deep analysis engine  102 ), and threat data is then passed to the IDS/IPS rule generator  106  for creation of a new or updated rule which may be implemented by IPS/IDS  120  to generate future alerts. The threat data may also be sent to orchestrator  105  for generation of a new or changed honey/port/device/net cyber sensor based thereon. Orchestrator  105  may build a new cyber sensor, or configure/modify an existing cyber sensor. 
         [0019]    In another alternative, honeycomb  100  and, particularly, active defense engine  150 , may execute an active response (e.g., an IPS Rule change, a router configuration change (e.g., change an Access Control List), a switch configuration change (e.g., vlan, or port authentication), the instantiation of a virtual clone of the potential target with tainted artifacts (e.g., watermarked documents, DLP tracking callbacks, and false data), etc. 
         [0020]    As illustrated, honeycomb  100  provides a continuous feedback loop to monitor attacks, respond to attacks, and to modify itself in order to best monitor future attacks. 
         [0021]      FIG. 3  includes a flow diagram of process  300  executed by orchestrator  105  to build, manage and deploy cyber sensors according to some embodiments. In some embodiments, one or more various hardware processing units (e.g., processor(s), processor core(s), execution thread(s)) of honeycomb  100  execute program code to perform process  300 . Process  300  and other processes mentioned herein may be embodied in processor-executable program code read from one or more non-transitory computer-readable media, such as a floppy disk, a CD-ROM, a DVD-ROM, a Flash drive, and a magnetic tape, and then stored in a compressed, uncompiled and/or encrypted format. In some embodiments, hard-wired circuitry may be used in place of, or in combination with, program code for implementation of processes according to some embodiments. Embodiments are therefore not limited to any specific combination of hardware and software. 
         [0022]    Process  302  may be controlled via UI  150  according to some embodiments. In this regard, honeycomb  100  may provide a Web server allowing a user to interface with and manage the elements of honeycomb  100  over the Web. 
         [0023]    Initially, at S 302 , it is determined whether orchestrator  105  is to build, manage/configure, or deploy a cyber sensor. Assuming orchestrator  105  is to build a cyber sensor, flow proceeds to S 304  to select a base component from a cyber sensor store. Such a store may be implemented by sensor repository  250  of  FIG. 2 . 
         [0024]    Next, at S 306 , key attributes of the cyber sensor are selected. The cyber sensor is built and tested at S 308  based on the selected key attributes, and is stored at S 310 . The cyber sensor may be stored in repository  250 . 
         [0025]    The selected key attributes may depend upon the type of situation to be sensed. For example, if suspicious Web traffic is to be sensed, the attributes of the cyber sensor may include, but are not limited to, Web Agent Data, plugins, fonts, screen resolution, a Cookies-enabled flag, Supercookies, HTTP ACCEPT headers, current date, time of day and remote user timezone, whether the user is connected via a TOR browser, time spent on page, MAC address vendor codes to learned MAC (ICS is rather deterministic), TTL, WindowSize, TCP Options, IP ID Field, Total Packet Length, and abnormal DNS packets. 
         [0026]    Attributes of a cyber sensor may also relate to browsing activity of particular users, for example to determine whether the apparent user is actually performing the browsing activity. These attributes may include indicators of whether or not the user navigates using keyboard shortcuts, of where the user clicks on Web pages (and how often), of how often the user uses auto suggestion, and of how often the user uses spell correction. 
         [0027]    With respect to determining whether a particular user is engaged in incoming query activity, cyber sensor attributes may specify: a distribution of short/general queries vs. specific/long tail queries; a frequency of search for data on products owned by the user; a frequency of advanced search command use; a frequency of typographical errors; a typing speed; a time spent on the search result page; a time between selecting different results of a same query; an average amount of search requests per day; an average amount of search requests per topic; a distribution of used search services (e.g., web/images /videos/real time/news/mobile); an average position of selected search results. 
         [0028]    In order to manage/configure an existing stored cyber sensor, the cyber sensor is selected from a store or from already-deployed cyber sensors at S 312 . A copy of the selected sensor is created at S 314  and, as described with respect to S 306 , key attributes of the cyber sensor are selected at S 316 . The cyber sensor is built and tested at S 318  based on the selected key attributes, and is stored at S 320 . In the case of an already-deployed sensor, the prior version is remotely imaged and archived at S 322 . The new cyber sensor is deployed at  324 , for example within one of Honeyports  210 , Honeydevice  220  or Honeynet  230 . 
         [0029]    Deployment of a cyber sensor may include selection of the cyber sensor from a store at S 326 , selection of a deployment location at S 328 , and testing of the deployment at S 330 . Testing may include introduction of data vectors which should be sensed and flagged by the cyber sensor, as well as vectors which should not be flagged by the cyber sensor. 
         [0030]    Testing and deployment of a cyber sensor is dependent upon on the specifics of the cyber sensor. In some instances, the testing may verify that an IPS sensor will fire in response to a particular vector, may confirm that a changed ACL is blocking what is expected to be blocked, and/or may lever routing and VLAN to connect virtual spun up targets. Conventional systems may be used to auto deploy software packages which include technologies like Honeyports. 
         [0031]    Data resulting from such testing is verified at S 332  via a dashboard and/or STEM  110 . Regarding such a dashboard, process  300  may be controlled via UI  150  according to some embodiments. In this regard, honeycomb  100  may provide a Web server and restful API calls allowing a user device to interface with and manage the elements of honeycomb  100  over the Web. 
         [0032]    Suitable user devices may include a desktop computer, a laptop computer, a tablet computer, and a smartphone. User devices may execute program code for presenting user interfaces to allow interaction with honeycomb  100  via any one or more communication protocols and communication networks. For example, such communication may conform to HyperText Transport Protocol, File Transfer Protocol, and/or any Software-as-a-Service protocol. 
         [0033]    Presentation of a user interface may include any degree or type of rendering, depending on the coding of the user interface. For example, a user device may include a desktop computer executing a Web Browser to receive a Web page or equivalent (e.g., in HTML format) from honeycomb  100  and may render and present the Web page according to known protocols. In one embodiment, the administrative device may present user interfaces by executing a standalone executable file (e.g., an .exe file) or code (e.g., a JAVA applet) within a virtual machine. 
         [0034]    Embodiments may provide flexibility via interfacing with other services via associated APIs. These APIs can be used to receive threat information and IPS/IDS rules, and also to push data for external analysis (e.g., a total number of detected viruses. 
         [0035]      FIG. 4  illustrates user interface  400  presented by a user device according to some embodiments. User interface  400  includes interfaces for managing the elements of honeycomb  100 , including the building, deployment and management of cyber sensors as described above. For example, area  410  of user interface may present current threats or issues which have been detected, and map  420  may indicate network locations at which such threats and issues are present. 
         [0036]      FIG. 5  illustrates a network architecture according to some embodiments. Network  510  may comprise an industrial control system or any other computing network for which network security is desired. Network  510  may implement honeycomb  100  of  FIG. 2 . Network  510  includes workstations  516  and  518  and database  514 . Web server  512  connects network  510  to Internet  520 . Network  510  may comprise any number and type of connected devices, sub-networks and topologies, communicating over any suitable communications media via any suitable protocols. 
         [0037]    Administrative network  530  may be used to remotely administer honeycomb  100  of network  510 . Such administration may occur via a Web-based UI  150 . Other devices  540 - 560  may also access UI  150  to manage honeycomb  100  of network  510 . 
         [0038]      FIG. 6  is a block diagram of system  600  according to some embodiments. System  600  may include a general-purpose computing system and may execute program code to perform any of the processes described herein. System  600  may include an implementation of honeycomb  100  according to some embodiments. System  600  may include other unshown elements according to some embodiments. 
         [0039]    System  600  includes one or more processors  610  operatively coupled to communication device  620 , data storage device  630 , one or more input devices  640 , one or more output devices  650  and memory  660 . Communication device  620  may facilitate communication with external devices, such as a reporting client, or a data storage device. Input device(s)  640  may include, for example, a keyboard, a keypad, a mouse or other pointing device, a microphone, knob or a switch, an infra-red (IR) port, a docking station, and/or a touch screen. Input device(s)  640  may be used, for example, to enter information into apparatus  600 . Output device(s)  650  may include, for example, a display (e.g., a display screen) a speaker, and/or a printer. 
         [0040]    Data storage device  630  may include any appropriate persistent storage device, including combinations of magnetic storage devices (e.g., magnetic tape, hard disk drives and flash memory), optical storage devices, Read Only Memory (ROM) devices, etc., while memory  660  may include Random Access Memory (RAM). 
         [0041]    Each of analysis engine  632 , active defense engine  633 , orchestrator  634  and rule generator  635  may include program code executed by processor(s)  610  to cause computing system  600  to perform any one or more of the processes described herein. Embodiments are not limited to execution of these processes by a single apparatus. 
         [0042]    Data storage device  630  also stores sensor repository  636  and system repository  637 , which may be configured and utilized as described herein. Data storage device  630  may store other data and other program code for providing additional functionality and/or which are necessary for operation of system  600 , such as device drivers, operating system files, etc. 
         [0043]    The foregoing diagrams represent logical architectures for describing processes according to some embodiments, and actual implementations may include more or different components arranged in other manners. Other topologies may be used in conjunction with other embodiments. Moreover, each system described herein may be implemented by any number of devices in communication via any number of other public and/or private networks. Two or more of such computing devices may be located remote from one another and may communicate with one another via any known manner of network(s) and/or a dedicated connection. Each device may include any number of hardware and/or software elements suitable to provide the functions described herein as well as any other functions. For example, any computing device used in an implementation of some embodiments may include a processor to execute program code such that the computing device operates as described herein. 
         [0044]    All systems and processes discussed herein may be embodied in program code stored on one or more non-transitory computer-readable media. Such media may include, for example, a floppy disk, a CD-ROM, a DVD-ROM, a Flash drive, magnetic tape, and solid state Random Access Memory (RAM) or Read Only Memory (ROM) storage units. Embodiments are therefore not limited to any specific combination of hardware and software. 
         [0045]    Embodiments described herein are solely for the purpose of illustration. A person of ordinary skill in the relevant art may recognize other embodiments may be practiced with modifications and alterations to that described above.

Technology Category: 5