1 1 00:00:00,240 --> 00:00:02,820 Training and exercises. 2 2 00:00:02,820 --> 00:00:05,370 Earlier in the course, we talked a little bit about training 3 3 00:00:05,370 --> 00:00:08,250 and exercises, so some of this will be a review. 4 4 00:00:08,250 --> 00:00:10,500 We're going to talk about tabletop exercises, 5 5 00:00:10,500 --> 00:00:14,070 penetration testing, and red, blue, and white exercises 6 6 00:00:14,070 --> 00:00:15,270 in this lesson. 7 7 00:00:15,270 --> 00:00:16,830 We are going to have some new information 8 8 00:00:16,830 --> 00:00:20,250 so please don't just skip ahead and watch this entire video. 9 9 00:00:20,250 --> 00:00:22,170 Now, when we talk about tabletop exercises, 10 10 00:00:22,170 --> 00:00:23,010 we mentioned before 11 11 00:00:23,010 --> 00:00:25,800 that these are exercises that use an incident scenario 12 12 00:00:25,800 --> 00:00:28,560 against a framework of controls or a red team. 13 13 00:00:28,560 --> 00:00:30,450 So what we're going to do here is we are going to 14 14 00:00:30,450 --> 00:00:33,720 carry a discussion of simulated emergency situations 15 15 00:00:33,720 --> 00:00:35,040 and security events. 16 16 00:00:35,040 --> 00:00:37,500 These are great because they're really simple to set up 17 17 00:00:37,500 --> 00:00:39,120 but they tend to be more theoretical 18 18 00:00:39,120 --> 00:00:41,460 in nature and they don't provide practical evidence 19 19 00:00:41,460 --> 00:00:43,800 of what could go wrong during a real event. 20 20 00:00:43,800 --> 00:00:44,633 For example, 21 21 00:00:44,633 --> 00:00:47,220 how long will a particular task take to complete? 22 22 00:00:47,220 --> 00:00:49,410 You really can't gather that from a tabletop, 23 23 00:00:49,410 --> 00:00:50,850 but if you actually go through the actions 24 24 00:00:50,850 --> 00:00:53,280 and motions in something like a penetration test, 25 25 00:00:53,280 --> 00:00:55,110 you'll be able to see that instead. 26 26 00:00:55,110 --> 00:00:55,943 Now, I've seen a lot 27 27 00:00:55,943 --> 00:00:57,990 of times when we're doing tabletop exercises 28 28 00:00:57,990 --> 00:01:00,300 that people start using their magic wands. 29 29 00:01:00,300 --> 00:01:01,920 Now, this is a bad thing to do 30 30 00:01:01,920 --> 00:01:03,430 because you can start getting the effect 31 31 00:01:03,430 --> 00:01:05,520 that something that might take a real team 32 32 00:01:05,520 --> 00:01:08,610 12 hours to do can really be solved in 30 minutes. 33 33 00:01:08,610 --> 00:01:10,440 And so when something really happens, 34 34 00:01:10,440 --> 00:01:12,750 the managers start going, well, in the tabletop, 35 35 00:01:12,750 --> 00:01:14,580 it only took us 30 minutes to solve. 36 36 00:01:14,580 --> 00:01:15,750 Why is it taking you 12 hours? 37 37 00:01:15,750 --> 00:01:17,520 I need this system up right now. 38 38 00:01:17,520 --> 00:01:19,500 And so you start getting this negative training, I call it, 39 39 00:01:19,500 --> 00:01:21,150 where you start training your senior leaders 40 40 00:01:21,150 --> 00:01:22,620 to expect things to happen faster 41 41 00:01:22,620 --> 00:01:24,420 in the real world than they really can. 42 42 00:01:24,420 --> 00:01:25,470 So just be careful about that 43 43 00:01:25,470 --> 00:01:27,930 if you're dealing with a tabletop exercise. 44 44 00:01:27,930 --> 00:01:29,760 Now, when you're dealing with a penetration test, 45 45 00:01:29,760 --> 00:01:31,529 this is a test that uses active tools 46 46 00:01:31,529 --> 00:01:34,470 and security utilities to evaluate security 47 47 00:01:34,470 --> 00:01:36,630 by simulating an attack on a system 48 48 00:01:36,630 --> 00:01:38,760 to verify that a threat really does exist. 49 49 00:01:38,760 --> 00:01:40,980 They actively test that threat and vulnerability. 50 50 00:01:40,980 --> 00:01:43,230 They bypass security controls and then finally 51 51 00:01:43,230 --> 00:01:46,260 exploit those vulnerabilities on a given system. 52 52 00:01:46,260 --> 00:01:48,000 When you're doing a penetration test, 53 53 00:01:48,000 --> 00:01:50,610 you are going to test the system to discover vulnerabilities 54 54 00:01:50,610 --> 00:01:52,710 or prove security controls are actually working 55 55 00:01:52,710 --> 00:01:53,820 as they're supposed to. 56 56 00:01:53,820 --> 00:01:55,380 You're also going to examine the system 57 57 00:01:55,380 --> 00:01:58,170 to identify any logical weaknesses that may be there 58 58 00:01:58,170 --> 00:01:59,970 inside the system architecture. 59 59 00:01:59,970 --> 00:02:02,520 And you're going to interview personnel to gather information 60 60 00:02:02,520 --> 00:02:05,400 and see how prone they are to social engineering attacks. 61 61 00:02:05,400 --> 00:02:06,480 All of these are things you can do 62 62 00:02:06,480 --> 00:02:08,460 as part of a penetration test. 63 63 00:02:08,460 --> 00:02:10,230 Now, when you're dealing with a penetration test, 64 64 00:02:10,230 --> 00:02:12,270 you have to make sure it is properly scoped 65 65 00:02:12,270 --> 00:02:14,700 and resourced before you can begin it. 66 66 00:02:14,700 --> 00:02:16,530 Now, what I mean by this is you have to figure out 67 67 00:02:16,530 --> 00:02:18,180 exactly what is going to be tested 68 68 00:02:18,180 --> 00:02:19,890 as part of the penetration test. 69 69 00:02:19,890 --> 00:02:22,020 If you get a penetration tester to come in 70 70 00:02:22,020 --> 00:02:23,400 and test your organization, you say, 71 71 00:02:23,400 --> 00:02:25,380 just go at the entire organization. 72 72 00:02:25,380 --> 00:02:27,120 That's not going to be very effective. 73 73 00:02:27,120 --> 00:02:29,580 Instead, you should tell them, hey, I'm really concerned 74 74 00:02:29,580 --> 00:02:31,020 about my Windows domain controller. 75 75 00:02:31,020 --> 00:02:33,720 I want you to see if you can get root access on that. 76 76 00:02:33,720 --> 00:02:35,520 And that would allow them to be able to identify 77 77 00:02:35,520 --> 00:02:37,170 exactly what your concerns are 78 78 00:02:37,170 --> 00:02:39,720 and verify your systems are working properly. 79 79 00:02:39,720 --> 00:02:41,700 Now, when you're dealing with a penetration test, 80 80 00:02:41,700 --> 00:02:44,850 you can use either an internal team or an external team. 81 81 00:02:44,850 --> 00:02:47,310 I personally like to use third parties who are external 82 82 00:02:47,310 --> 00:02:50,490 to the organization or a separate internal red team. 83 83 00:02:50,490 --> 00:02:52,350 I don't like to use my system administrators 84 84 00:02:52,350 --> 00:02:54,000 to conduct penetration tests. 85 85 00:02:54,000 --> 00:02:56,130 It's not that they're not smart enough to do it, 86 86 00:02:56,130 --> 00:02:57,930 it's that they're biased in their approach. 87 87 00:02:57,930 --> 00:02:59,070 When you have a system administrator 88 88 00:02:59,070 --> 00:03:00,900 trying to pen test their own system, 89 89 00:03:00,900 --> 00:03:03,180 what ends up happening is they start trying to 90 90 00:03:03,180 --> 00:03:04,950 prove the system is secure 91 91 00:03:04,950 --> 00:03:07,770 instead of trying to prove the system can be attacked. 92 92 00:03:07,770 --> 00:03:11,220 As a penetration tester, our job is to be the bad guy. 93 93 00:03:11,220 --> 00:03:13,260 It's to go in and find all the holes. 94 94 00:03:13,260 --> 00:03:14,910 We want to find all the weaknesses, 95 95 00:03:14,910 --> 00:03:17,700 and the system administrators tend to try to not do that 96 96 00:03:17,700 --> 00:03:19,200 because they're trying to prove that their work 97 97 00:03:19,200 --> 00:03:21,960 that they did securing the system is adequate. 98 98 00:03:21,960 --> 00:03:23,190 And so it's a different perspective, 99 99 00:03:23,190 --> 00:03:25,350 and that's why I much prefer a third party 100 100 00:03:25,350 --> 00:03:27,360 or an internal red team be used 101 101 00:03:27,360 --> 00:03:29,220 instead of system administrators. 102 102 00:03:29,220 --> 00:03:31,110 Now, if you want to learn more about pen testing, 103 103 00:03:31,110 --> 00:03:32,970 as I said before, you should check out 104 104 00:03:32,970 --> 00:03:35,100 the CompTIA Pen Test+ curriculum. 105 105 00:03:35,100 --> 00:03:37,050 In that course, there is a ton of information 106 106 00:03:37,050 --> 00:03:38,160 on how you can become a member 107 107 00:03:38,160 --> 00:03:40,650 of the penetration testing team and learning how 108 108 00:03:40,650 --> 00:03:44,220 to attack these systems from that outsider perspective. 109 109 00:03:44,220 --> 00:03:45,870 Now, the last thing we want to talk about in this lesson 110 110 00:03:45,870 --> 00:03:48,900 is our red teams, our blue teams, and our white teams. 111 111 00:03:48,900 --> 00:03:50,160 When we talk about red teams, 112 112 00:03:50,160 --> 00:03:52,080 these are the hostile or attacking teams 113 113 00:03:52,080 --> 00:03:55,230 in a penetration test or an instant response exercise. 114 114 00:03:55,230 --> 00:03:58,680 If you hire that third party team, that is a red team. 115 115 00:03:58,680 --> 00:04:00,750 They're trying to attack your systems. 116 116 00:04:00,750 --> 00:04:01,950 When we're talking about blue teams, 117 117 00:04:01,950 --> 00:04:03,330 this is our defensive teams 118 118 00:04:03,330 --> 00:04:06,390 in a penetration test or an incident response exercise. 119 119 00:04:06,390 --> 00:04:07,980 This is our system administrators, 120 120 00:04:07,980 --> 00:04:09,690 this is our network defenders, 121 121 00:04:09,690 --> 00:04:12,480 this is our cybersecurity analysts like you. 122 122 00:04:12,480 --> 00:04:14,550 You're going to be part of the blue team. 123 123 00:04:14,550 --> 00:04:15,990 And then we have the white team. 124 124 00:04:15,990 --> 00:04:18,240 This is a staff who administers, evaluates, 125 125 00:04:18,240 --> 00:04:20,310 and supervises a penetration test 126 126 00:04:20,310 --> 00:04:22,140 or instant response exercise. 127 127 00:04:22,140 --> 00:04:24,300 They're also going to be responsible for building the network 128 128 00:04:24,300 --> 00:04:26,280 if you're going to be using a third party network 129 129 00:04:26,280 --> 00:04:27,600 as part of your test. 130 130 00:04:27,600 --> 00:04:30,270 Sometimes organizations don't want to do active testing 131 131 00:04:30,270 --> 00:04:31,830 on their real live networks, 132 132 00:04:31,830 --> 00:04:33,210 so they'll build a training ground 133 133 00:04:33,210 --> 00:04:34,950 and they'll put their red teams and their blue teams 134 134 00:04:34,950 --> 00:04:37,230 if they have internal red teams and internal blue teams 135 135 00:04:37,230 --> 00:04:39,480 against each other in this simulated environment. 136 136 00:04:39,480 --> 00:04:41,220 Well, somebody has to build 137 137 00:04:41,220 --> 00:04:42,990 and support this entire ecosystem, 138 138 00:04:42,990 --> 00:04:44,790 and that's what the white team will do. 139 139 00:04:44,790 --> 00:04:47,160 I like to think about the white team as the referees. 140 140 00:04:47,160 --> 00:04:48,720 They're also going to be the ones who are going to report 141 141 00:04:48,720 --> 00:04:51,570 after the event and say, this is what the red team did well, 142 142 00:04:51,570 --> 00:04:52,890 this is what the blue team did well, 143 143 00:04:52,890 --> 00:04:54,810 and here's what they both did not so well. 144 144 00:04:54,810 --> 00:04:56,510 That's the role of the white team.