Securosis Blog

Sure, the RSA Recovery Breakfast was a huge hit, but let’s be honest – if there’s any conference that really needs a recovery breakfast it has to be Black Hat.

I’ve been a bit erratic with my Dark Reading posts, but finally have a new one up. This one is dedicated to the topic du jour – cloud computing security. The article is The Only Two Reliable Cloud Security Controls and here’s an excerpt:

Data Labels Suck

Rich · July 8, 2009

I had a weird discussion with someone who was firmly convinced that you couldn’t possibly have data security without starting with classification and labels. Maybe they read it in a book or something.

I can’t entirely promise tonight’s episode makes a lot of sense. Martin is back from Kyoto, and seriously jetlagged, and I don’t think I was a whole lot better. Sure, we cover the usual collection of security news, but the episode is filled with non-sequitors and other dissociated transitions. On the other hand, we do stick fairly closely to security related topics. In other words, listen at your own risk.

Social Security Number Code Cracked

Adrian Lane · July 7, 2009

An interesting news item on how social security numbers can be guessed with surprising accuracy made this morning’s paper. Researchers say they can determine much of someone’s social security number from birth date and location. Hopefully this will shine yet another spotlight on our over-reliance on social security numbers as a method of identification. From the San Jose Mercury news:

Database Security: The Other First Steps

Adrian Lane · July 3, 2009

Going through my feed reader this morning when I ran across this post on Dark Reading about Your First Three Steps for database security. As these are supposed to be your first steps with database security,
the suggestions not only struck me as places I would not start, it offered a method that I would not employ. I believe that there there is a better way to proceed, so I offer you my alternative set of recommendations.

Securosis: On Holiday

Adrian Lane · July 3, 2009

As it’s the middle of summer, it’s freakin’ hot here. Rich and I have been cranking away like crazy since RSA on a couple different projects and are in need of a break. Now it’s time for a little R&R, so like you, we going on a mini summer break. That means no Friday Summary this week. We’ll be back around the 7th, and return to normal Friday posts on the 10th. Until then, enjoy yourself over the July 4th holiday (even if you’re not in the U.S.)! If you haven’t yet taken the Project Quant…

Cracking a 200 Year Old Cipher

Adrian Lane · July 2, 2009

I have a half dozen books on Thomas Jefferson’s life, but this is a pretty cool story I had never heard before. The Wall Street Journal this morning has a story about a Professor Robert Patterson, who had developed what appears to be a reasonably advanced cipher, and sent an enciphered message to President Jefferson in 1801. He provided Jefferson with the the message, the cipher, and hints as to how it worked, but it is assumed that Jefferson was never able to decrypt the message. The message…

When I interview database candidates, I want to asses their skills in three different areas; how well they can set-up and maintain a database, how well they can program to a database, and how well they can design database systems. These coincide with the three roles I would typically hire: database administrator, database programmer and database architect. Even though I am hiring for just one of these roles, and I don’t expect any single candidate to be fully proficient in all three areas, I do…

This is Part 5 of our Database Encryption Series. Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4, and the supporting posts on Database vs. Application Encryption, & Database Encryption: Fact or Fiction are online.