CS 155 Syllabus

The course covers principles of computer systems security. We will discuss various attack techniques and how to defend against them. Topics include Network attacks and defenses, Operating system holes, application security (web, e-mail, databases), viruses, social engineering attacks, privacy, and digital rights management. Course projects will focus on building reliable code. The course is intended for senior undergraduates and first year graduate students.

Topics

Introduction

• Course outline. Law enforcement. Social engineering techniques.
  Reading: Reflections on Trusting Trust, Ken Thompson.

Part I: Application security

• Some examples of things that go wrong.
  setuid programs, misconfiguration, macro languages, hidden functionality, buggy software.
  Reading: Improving the security of your site by breaking into it, Dan Farmer, Wietse Venema.
   
• Examples and tools for designing secure application code. [ppt]
  Reading: Using Programmer-Written Compiler Extensions to Catch Security Holes, Ken Ashcraft, Dawson Engler
   
• Buffer overflow attacks and other common bugs. [ppt]
  Finding overflows. Exploiting overflows. Defenses.
  Reading:
  Smashing The Stack For Fun And Profit, Aleph One.
  Buffer Overflows: Attacks and Defenses for the Vulnerability of the Decade, Crispin Cowan, et al.
  Exploiting Format String Vulnerabilities, team teso.
   
• Dealing with bad (legacy) application code. Sandboxing. [ppt]
  Reading:
  A note on the confinement problem, Butler Lampson.
  A secure environment for untrusted helper applications: confining the wily hacker, Ian Goldberg, David Wagner, et al.
  Traps and Pitfalls: Practical Problems in System Call Interposition Based Security Tools, Tal Garfinkel.
   
• Web browser and mobile code security . [ppt]
  Reading: McGraw and Felten, Securing Java, Chapter 2.
   
• Web site security: attacks and defenses
  Reading:
  Dos and Don'ts of Client Authentication on the Web, Kevin Fu, Emil Sit, Kendra Smith, and Nick Feamster.
  Cross site scripting explained, Amit Klein.
  SQL Injection attacks, Chris Anley.
   
• Viruses and Worms.
  Reading:
  P. Szor, P. Ferrie, Hunting for metamorphic. 2001.
  Nachenberg, Computer Virus-Antivirus Coevolution. Comm. ACM, 40(1), pp. 46-51, January 1997.
   
• Use of cryptography in computer security . [ppt]
  Reading: Ross Anderson, Why cryptosystems fail. Optional: WEP protocol security.
   

  Part II: OS Security

• Secure operating systems. Access control and file system security . [ppt] (1.5 lectures)
  Reading: J.H. Saltzer and M.D. Schroeder, The Protection of Information in Computer Systems.
  The first three pages and section 5.2 of Setuid Demystified, by Chen, Wagner, and Dean.
  See Access control pages and Common Criteria description for further information on Windows.
   
• User authentication. [ppt] (half  lecture)
  Passwords, challenge-response, biometrics, token-based authentication. Single-sign-on, MS Passport, Liberty Alliance.
   
• Authentication in remote file systems and Kerberos. [ppt] (half lecture)
  Unix file sharing (NFS, AFS) and Windows file sharing (SMB, LanMan, NTLM); Kerberos.
  Reading: Kerberos Authentication.
   
• Intrusion detection . [ppt] (half lecture)
  Reading: Paxson, Bro: A System for Detecting Network Intruders in Real-Time. Proc. 7th USENIX Security Symposium, San Antonio, TX, January 1998.
   
• Digital Rights Management. NGSCB and TCG.
   

  Part III: Network security

• Insecurity in existing network protocols . [ppt]
  Reading: Steven M. Bellovin, Security Problems in the TCP/IP Protocol Suite, in Computer Communications Review 2:19, pp. 32-48, April 1989,
  Using the Domain Name System for System Break-Ins, in Proc Fifth Usenix UNIX Security Symposium, Salt Lake City, UT, June, 1995.
   
• Security protocols: IPsec, DNSsec, SPF.
  Reading:
   
• Firewalls . [ppt]
  Reading: Insertion, Evasion, and Denial of Service: Eluding Network Intrusion Detection, T. Ptacek and T. Newsham.
   
• Denial of service attacks. . [ppt]
  Reading: The TFN distributed denial of service attack tool, D. Dittrich
  Practical network support for IP Traceback, S. Savage, et al.
   

  Part IV: Final topics

• Electronic transfer of money - Guest lecture by Pat Faith, VISA USA.
  Payment mechanisms on the Internet. The visa payment system.
   
• Electronic voting. . [ppt]
  Voting, DRE machines, and the Diebold case study. Discussion of cryptographic approaches.
  Reading: T. Kohno, A. Stubblefield, A. Rubin, D. Wallach, Analysis of an Electronic Voting System, in IEEE Symposium on Security and Privacy 2004. IEEE Computer Society Press, May 2004.