Network Security Post #6

      Information and system security for individuals are important because such information of people's private data, which includes pictures, emails, bank accounts, and social media accounts being hacked, can put someone's life at risk, more so their reputation, and financial hardship such as getting their identity stolen. Equally important in organizations, the information of customers' data, such as in the healthcare industry, can put a burden on both the patient and the hospital. Having their data stolen from Servers can compromise government and other private sectors as well as hacking individuals' computers, like a CEO of a company, which leads to selling this information to competitors. The greatest security threat to an organization is their staff because they are prone to being hack and compromise due to lack of education, Email Spam, phishing, password creation, social engineering, and not understanding the severity of such threats.

    One type of attack that can be executed using ping command is Smurf attack, "which abuses the Ping command, which checks reachability of a network." The attacker sends ICMP echo request; as a result, the computer on the Network sends all ICMP relay packets to the attacker, and when a massive number of pings are executed, the response packets add up to a much larger number of ICMP echo replies, thus flooding the Network. To prevent this attack, we can turn off the protocol ICMP. Koga, K., Okazaki, N., Watanabe, A., & Park, M. rang. (2011). A proposal of an extended method of IP trace-back for distributed denial of service attacks using a dynamic marking scheme. Electronics & Communications in Japan, 94(page 2 1.1.2 Smurf)

    Security holes and vulnerabilities can be used to breach security; this type of vulnerability threat exists in operating systems of all manufacturers, including Mac OS, Windows, iOS, Android, and Linux systems). These weaknesses are continually put to the test by hackers who find ways to infiltrate OS systems. The significant impact on such systems focuses on Windows Servers and Network systems, which can cause a significant blow to an organization's security infrastructure. My proposed recommendation is to prevent and protect from security holes is to constantly update the operating systems for all servers and network devices, as well as pushing updates (also known as patches) to all computer systems in such an organization. For example, Windows retire XP and Windows 7 from updating its operating systems, thus forcing users to upgrade to Windows 10 to keep their networks protected.

    A phishing attack is a type of social engineering attack that is used to steal information. An attacker will lure a victim into thinking they are the legitimate originator of the source they seek to do business with, thus masquerading as a trusted source. Doing so can lead to malware, ransomware, and steal critical data. My proposed recommendation for protecting the network infrastructure from phishing is from a scholarly article on training to mitigate such attacks. "To prevent phishing attacks, organizations often rely on three techniques: (1) automated removal or quarantine of phishing messages and corresponding websites; (2) automated warning mechanisms that notify individuals when they encounter a suspicious message or website; and (3) behavioral training during which individuals are taught to identify and report attacks, Jensen, M. L., Dinger, M., Wright, R. T., & Thatcher, J. B. (2017). Training to Mitigate Phishing Attacks Using Mindfulness Techniques. Journal of Management Information Systems (page 599).

Computers in the Workplace Post#5

 I choose to discuss the healthcare industry because I work for a hospital. My experience in healthcare started back when I was hired as a Desktop Technician. We deploy laptops and desktops to several departments and individuals. As we prepare computers out of the box, we install a standard image for all PCs. While all are standardized images, where people use them as generic with limited use, other than the applications they need to perform their duties, the physicians have more accessibilities to other applications and we allow more customization by the end-user. One practice we follow, across the board, is to encrypt the computers. We use the Bitlocker application, made by Microsoft, to encrypt the devices, and the Bitlocker description information is stored in Active Directory. The function of "Computer on Wheels" is to give the Nurses portable accessibility to computers to chart patient information when entering the patient rooms. These computers have limited access, which only a few applications for them to use, they also have a time-session after 5 minutes of use, if they sit idle it will log them out and forces them to enter their credentials upon returning to use them. The PCs in the Operating rooms and Emergency department have more access to many more features and the time-out is extended to 15 minutes of use. It is important for everyone to know security best practices when it comes to replying to emails or creating passwords that can be easily hacked. We randomly get emails from phishing and scammers and most of them come from the Security team to learn what end-users need more education on. The historic trends of computing are moving towards Virtual applications and Virtual machines. The forecast of computer hardware is to get rid of old Computer Workstations and move to smaller units that connect to servers that host all applications, like Office and such. We hire penetration companies, to find vulnerabilities in our systems. 

Traveling through a Network Post#4

  

For the ping command using Google, the router passes through only one which is the 172.217.8.142 address. It first looks up and displays the IP address that relates with its domain name. The lines that follow are four replies from the destination IP address. The round-trip time or each echo response (in milliseconds) are 16ms, 17ms and 22ms. No error messages on the output. The overall statistics are zero loss packets and the success rates and the range the range or round-trip times is 18 milliseconds.

For the ping command using Telekom.de (Germany), the router passes through only one which is the 80.158.67.40 address. It first looks up and displays the IP address that relates to its domain name. The lines that follow are four replies with a “Request time out”. The round-trip time or each echo response is zero. The overall statistics is 100 percent loss packets with no success rates and no round-trip times.

For the ping command using Cyberops.in (India), the router passes through only one which is the 1104.238.80.162 address. It first looks up and displays the IP address that relates to its corresponding domain name. The lines that follow are four replies from the destination IP address. The round-trip time or each echo response (in milliseconds) are 89ms, 86ms and 85ms. No error messages on the output. The overall statistics are zero loss packets and the range the range or round-trip times is 86 milliseconds.

Traceroute

For Google, the traceroute command shows each line representing a hop to a router that its further away, in this case it hits my home router, followed by my IPS (Comcast) and routes total of 12 hops. The traceroute was successful because the final line represents the destination IP address that the domain name resolve to its IP. The round-trip time that it takes for a packet to travel to each router is between 13 milliseconds and 20 milliseconds. Traceroute send out three packets to each hop, and from the results its shows a consistent connection.

For CyberOps.in (India), the traceroute command shows each line representing a hop to a router that its further away, in this case it hits my home router, followed by my IPS (Comcast) and routes total of 16 hops. The traceroute was successful because the final line represents the destination IP address that the domain name resolve to its IP which is 104.238.80.162. The round-trip time that it takes for a packet to travel to each router is between 15 milliseconds and 426 milliseconds. Traceroute send out three packets to each hop, and from the results it shows a consistent connection yet a longer route since it is in India.

For Telekom.de (Germany) the traceroute command shows each line representing a hop to a router that its further away, and routes total of 16 hops ending Germany’s location. The traceroute was not successful because the final line did not represent the destination IP address that the domain name resolve to its IP , it ends with a different IP of 87.19.235.70, yet it hits Deutschland ISP of DTAG.DE. The round-trip time that it takes for a packet to travel to each router is between 13 milliseconds and 145 milliseconds. The icon * tells me the command timed out before receiving a response, which is different from India. This indicates * packet loss and unsuccessful hop process. 

One possible reason why a ping can be useful to troubleshoot is to find out if the IP is live or the device in question is on Online, or if the IP has been changed to a new one. For Traceroute, you can see if the route ends prior to where you are trying to reach, this could be a Switch or Router is dead. 

Documenting a Day Post#3

 Reflecting on my experience with the applications given to work with, all were a learning experience. In part one, Word processor was fun to use, especially identifying the ten tasks I engage in daily. Formatting the text with different font options, adding a numbers list to count how many listed, and adjusting the alignment was easy to use. Part two, using a spreadsheet, Excel was a challenge because calculating percentages and manipulating the database was quite a challenge. Excel for Mac does not have the option to “Sort by Hours” within Data-Sort and Filter; I spent almost an hour trying to figure out how to Sort by Hours; I then upload the Excel spreadsheet in Google Sheets and also encounter the same issue. Using my work laptop, I was able to do this task in Microsoft excel office 365, in addition, the “My data has headers” was also not an option in Mac or Google. The pie chart was fun to use and select the 2D option. The pie chart is a clear way to see how hours get spent and sadly not enough family time, which I tend to change this. The advantage of using Excel and manipulating the database was good exercise, and glad I was able to figure it out. The advantages of each of these applications, including PowerPoint, are that each has its specialty, yet you can add text. I recommend all applications to document the information about my day; clearly, the Excel exercise is the most accurate of all. One additional scenario I would use for Word is to create a resume, for Excel is to make my meal intakes, for PowerPoint is to show before and after remodel of a home and database application to get percentages of driving time from work, home, and leisure. The activity in Chapter 5: Computer applications in Computing Technology was a great exercise to start and understand different aspects of Word documentation.

Web / Mobile App Critique Post #2

  

Microsoft OneNote is a Non-linear form of Microsoft word. A virtual file storage device to organize your data. You can draw anywhere, you can organize whatever is you have in different notebooks, you can basically draw anywhere.  Create tabs to categorize your notes, catalog recipes, organize note and it synchronizes your data across different platforms. OneDrive is the main application where all your Microsoft applications reside. For example, say you are working on configuring a network device and all your configuration files are in OneNote application, if your laptop suddenly loses power or shuts down, you can go to Onenote in Office 365 and access your data from a mobile device, from an iOS or Android device. At work, we use OneNote to keep our daily tasks up to date and see what team is assigned tasks related to a project. One of my favorite features is tapping the OneNote badge and take a note anytime without opening the App. Whether is pictures, ideas, and clips. In addition, it lets you draw over other apps, but you will need permission to do so. OneNote is part of the Office365 bundle, and it integrates with Teams App. Teams App is used for our secure intranet chat and exchange files which are the link to OneNote. Teams app allows you to upload pictures and option to react with a like, love, thumbs up, surprised or dislike emoji, as well edit your chat or delete it; these are basic and few reactions yet it is effective for professional communication. With the OneNote Web clipper, you can capture any webpage, and edit, annotate or share with your colleagues. For example, when there are bugs in a program or new features from other applications that we use, we can clip only the article, or product information, from here you can add text, direct it where you like to save it to and bookmark it as well. You will have to download the web browser extension but is totally worth it. Another cool feature from the mobile is the sticky note feature which I use religiously, it allows me to take pictures, change fonts, bullet points and share them. To reorder tabs, you can drag and drop and change the color of them also. When copying a text, just like Word, it gives you the option to keep Source Formatting, Match Formatting, or simply Keep Text Only. I mainly use this App for all of our Infrastructure Team Notes, which includes several tabs, for example, Meeting notes, Site Information (for Hospital and clinics throughout our County), Group Policy, Projects, Data Centers, Purchasing, Processes, Active Directory, Rack layout and much more useful information readily available in my mobile device. The three recommendations for improvements are, to password protect notes within your mobile app, the second is to see tabs like in the desktop application, and the third is to be able to have navigation options from the ribbon, for example, the Home, Insert, Draw and View ribbons. The mobile app is limited what you can do compare to the desktop app, yet all the work you do in the Desktop App syncs with your mobile app, including pictures, PDF, Excel files and Video.

 

Tech Topic Connection Post#7

My selected tech topic, Network Security, connects to the fundamentals of information technology covered in this course on all topics. From a programming language perspective, an attacker can inject malicious code that can alter the outcome for the end-user or direct them to a server that can install malware. As far as Web/Mobile Applications, an attacker can modify an application that can listen or record your private life. Computers in the workplace are the main target for an attacker; this can be done by phishing, installing trojans, viruses, worms, or hacking a password with elevated privileges. All of these concepts relate to Network security and computer science, in one form or the other, for example, an attacker and flood certain type of the network by using the ping command creating a denial of service attack, one example taking down a website by crashing it, thus creating a denial to enter such site; a website such as healthcare.gov is another example. Servers store information that can be compromised; a brute force attack can be devastating to an organization. Equally important is stealing such information from a database and hold it for ransom. Network Security is critical to be able to maintain such information. Management must use best practices to analyze and prevent this type of attack. With a network security system that can run on multiple servers, the attack prevention process can be done faster because when one server detects an attack, another server will take precautions by retrieving the information that has entered the collector database synchronizing all servers other servers can prevent attacks before an attack occurs on that server.. One example of such attack is the healthcare government website, Idhom, M., Wahanani, H. E., & Fauzi, A. (2020). Network Security System on Multiple Servers Against Brute Force Attacks. 2020 6th Information Technology International Seminar (ITIS), Information Technology International Seminar (ITIS), 2020 6th, 258–262.

Network Security in an infrastructure environment relies on hardware components such as Firewalls. This Firewalls must be updated with the latest patches to prevent attackers from infiltrating the network with old vulnerabilities. Other methods of protecting the network is through programming switches and routers to prevent man-in-the-middle attacks. Application software plays a big role in protecting network access, such as two-way factor authentication. My chosen topic relates to database management in protecting infiltrators from injecting SQL attacks. Network architecture must be analyzed to prevent loopholes and vulnerabilities. Security Management should have documentation of security best practices, have a macro view of the network, access policies and configuration compliance, simulate attacks; one example is to hire a third-party vendor to infiltrate and/or penetrate the network. And continuously find other methods to test and find security flaws. With visibility on both the network and device level, tremendous amounts of data are translated into intelligence that deciphers complicated network security transactions into manageable, actionable information. With this insight, attack simulation can then prioritize vulnerabilities and eliminate the attack vectors that are most critical to the organization, protecting business services and data. Finally, change management can automate and optimize security processes to improve security and reduce the security”. Best practices for network security management." Network World 30 Jan. 2014. Business Insights: Global. Web. 18 Feb. 2021.URLhttp://bi.gale.com.proxylibrary.ashford.edu/global/article/GALE%7CA357439690?u=ashford Document Number:GALE|A357439690