Re: "False postive" database idea

From: George Bakos (gbakos_at_ists.dartmouth.edu)
Date: 09/25/03

  • Next message: Anton A. Chuvakin: "Re: "False postive" database idea"
    Date: Thu, 25 Sep 2003 17:58:01 -0400
    To: "Anton A. Chuvakin" <anton@chuvakin.org>
    
    

    On Thu, 25 Sep 2003 17:22:08 -0400 (EDT)
    "Anton A. Chuvakin" <anton@chuvakin.org> wrote:

    > George and all,
    >
    > >A bugzilla approach might make more sense, so that the appropriate
    > >developers are afforded the opportunity to address any issues with their

    > Hmm, not sure. That kinda implies that "false positives" are "bugs" in
    > NIDSs, which (IMHO) they are not.

    I agree completely. Bugzilla submissions need not imply a flaw, merely a
    condition that is being brought to the attention of the
    community/developers. Should there be a number of submissions pertaining
    to rule XYZ, that knowledge may help an analyst in their triage of the
    dozens of daily "high-priority" reports.

    Again IMHO, FPs are inherent to
    > signature-based ID and can be reduced (via many means), but not "turned
    > off" (I am assuming everybody saw this equation of FPs vs FNs). The most
    > recent realization I had on that was when my Dragon NIDS produced a P#RN
    > signature as a result of somebody reading an Apache manual (just like the
    > signature doc said it might) :-) Obviously, NIDSs are still incrediblky
    > useful in spite of that!
    >
    > I suspect that vendors might want to adjust signatures if there are
    > persistent reports about some particular sig being very FP-prone, but not
    > really based on every single report.

    Not necessarily vendors, but users. One of the primary benefits of
    open-source rule definitions is the ability to tune any NIDS rule to a
    greater extent than just ON, OFF, or report threshold X. The challenge of
    deciding, initially and over time, which of the thousands of available
    rules to tune can be a daunting one for many, and can be made considerably
    simpler through such a database. Unfortunately, I have been at too many
    sites where default rulessets are turned on and left alone, resulting in
    mountains of impertinent logs. Statistical analysis methods and enterprise
    management consoles help, but simple site/organization-specific rule
    tuning yields huge payoffs.

    Cheers!

    > Best,
    > --
    > Anton A. Chuvakin, Ph.D., GCI*
    > http://www.chuvakin.org
    > http://www.info-secure.org

    -- 
    George Bakos
    Institute for Security Technology Studies - IRIA
    Dartmouth College
    gbakos@ists.dartmouth.edu
    603.646.0665 -voice
    603.646.0666 -fax
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  • Next message: Anton A. Chuvakin: "Re: "False postive" database idea"

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