SSCP Exam Dumps - ISC 2 Credentials Questions and Answers

Because a network-based IDS reviews packets and headers, denial of service attacks can also be detected.

This question is an easy question if you go through the process of elimination. When you see an answer containing the keyword: ALL It is something a give away that it is not the proper answer. On the real exam you may encounter a few question where the use of the work ALL renders the choice invalid. Pay close attention to such keyword.

The following are incorrect answers:

Even though most IDSs can detect some viruses and some password guessing attacks, they cannot detect ALL viruses or ALL password guessing attacks. Therefore these two answers are only detractors.

Unless the IDS knows the valid values for a certain dataset, it can NOT detect data corruption.

Reference used for this question:

KRUTZ, Ronald L. & VINES, Russel D., The CISSP Prep Guide: Mastering the Ten Domains of Computer Security, 2001, John Wiley & Sons, Page 48.

Accountability can actually be seen in two different ways:

1) Although audit trails are also needed for accountability, no user can be accountable for their actions unless properly authenticated.

2) Accountability is another facet of access control. Individuals on a system are responsible for their actions. This accountability property enables system activities to be traced to the proper individuals. Accountability is supported by audit trails that record events on the system and network. Audit trails can be used for intrusion detection and for the reconstruction of past events. Monitoring individual activities, such as keystroke monitoring, should be accomplished in accordance with the company policy and appropriate laws. Banners at the log-on time should notify the user of any monitoring that is being conducted.

The point is that unless you employ an appropriate auditing mechanism, you don't have accountability. Authorization only gives a user certain permissions on the network. Accountability is far more complex because it also includes intrusion detection, unauthorized actions by both unauthorized users and authorized users, and system faults. The audit trail provides the proof that unauthorized modifications by both authorized and unauthorized users took place. No proof, No accountability.

Source: KRUTZ, Ronald L. & VINES, Russel D., The CISSP Prep Guide: Mastering the Ten Domains of Computer Security, John Wiley & Sons, 2001, Page 50.

The Shon Harris AIO book, 4th Edition, on Page 243 also states:

Auditing Capabilities ensures users are accountable for their actions, verify that the secutiy policies are enforced,

and can be used as investigation tools. Accountability is tracked by recording user, system, and application activities.

This recording is done through auditing functions and mechanisms within an operating sytem or application.

Audit trail contain information about operating System activities, application events, and user actions.

It is recommended that testing does not exceed established frequency limits. For a plan to be effective, all components of the BCP should be tested at least once a year. Also, if there is a major change in the operations of the organization, the plan should be revised and tested not more than three months after the change becomes operational.

Source: BARNES, James C. & ROTHSTEIN, Philip J., A Guide to Business Continuity Planning, John Wiley & Sons, 2001 (page 165).

The security controls and mechanisms that are in place must have a degree of transparency.

This enables the user to perform tasks and duties without having to go through extra steps because of the presence of the security controls. Transparency also does not let the user know too much about the controls, which helps prevent him from figuring out how to circumvent them. If the controls are too obvious, an attacker can figure out how to compromise them more easily.

Security (more specifically, the implementation of most security controls) has long been a sore point with users who are subject to security controls. Historically, security controls have been very intrusive to users, forcing them to interrupt their work flow and remember arcane codes or processes (like long passwords or access codes), and have generally been seen as an obstacle to getting work done. In recent years, much work has been done to remove that stigma of security controls as a detractor from the work process adding nothing but time and money. When developing access control, the system must be as transparent as possible to the end user. The users should be required to interact with the system as little as possible, and the process around using the control should be engineered so as to involve little effort on the part of the user.

For example, requiring a user to swipe an access card through a reader is an effective way to ensure a person is authorized to enter a room. However, implementing a technology (such as RFID) that will automatically scan the badge as the user approaches the door is more transparent to the user and will do less to impede the movement of personnel in a busy area.

In another example, asking a user to understand what applications and data sets will be required when requesting a system ID and then specifically requesting access to those resources may allow for a great deal of granularity when provisioning access, but it can hardly be seen as transparent. A more transparent process would be for the access provisioning system to have a role-based structure, where the user would simply specify the role he or she has in the organization and the system would know the specific resources that user needs to access based on that role. This requires less work and interaction on the part of the user and will lead to more accurate and secure access control decisions because access will be based on predefined need, not user preference.

When developing and implementing an access control system special care should be taken to ensure that the control is as transparent to the end user as possible and interrupts his work flow as little as possible.

The following answers were incorrect:

All of the other detractors were incorrect.

Reference(s) used for this question:

HARRIS, Shon, All-In-One CISSP Certification Exam Guide, 6th edition. Operations Security, Page 1239-1240

Harris, Shon (2012-10-25). CISSP All-in-One Exam Guide, 6th Edition (Kindle Locations 25278-25281). McGraw-Hill. Kindle Edition.

Schneiter, Andrew (2013-04-15). Official (ISC)2 Guide to the CISSP CBK, Third Edition : Access Control ((ISC)2 Press) (Kindle Locations 713-729). Auerbach Publications. Kindle Edition.

Which means the company understands the level of risk it is faced.

The following answers are incorrect because :

Reject the risk is incorrect as it means ignoring the risk which is dangerous.

Perform another risk analysis is also incorrect as the existing risk analysis has already shown the results.

Reduce the risk is incorrect is applicable after implementing the countermeasures.

Reference : Shon Harris AIO v3 , Chapter-3: Security Management Practices , Page : 39

Making the determination to decide what level of classification the information requires is the main responsibility of the data owner.

The data owner within classification is a person from Management who has been entrusted with a data set that belong to the company. It could be for example the Chief Financial Officer (CFO) who has been entrusted with all financial date or it could be the Human Resource Director who has been entrusted with all Human Resource data. The information owner will decide what classification will be applied to the data based on Confidentiality, Integrity, Availability, Criticality, and Sensitivity of the data.

The Custodian is the technical person who will implement the proper classification on objects in accordance with the Data Owner. The custodian DOES NOT decide what classification to apply, it is the Data Owner who will dictate to the Custodian what is the classification to apply.

NOTE:

The term Data Owner is also used within Discretionary Access Control (DAC). Within DAC it means the person who has created an object. For example, if I create a file on my system then I am the owner of the file and I can decide who else could get access to the file. It is left to my discretion. Within DAC access is granted based solely on the Identity of the subject, this is why sometimes DAC is referred to as Identity Based Access Control.

The other choices were not the best answer

Running regular backups is the responsibility of custodian.

Audit the data users is the responsibility of the auditors

Periodically check the validity and accuracy of the data is not one of the data owner responsibility

Reference(s) used for this question:

KRUTZ, Ronald L. & VINES, Russel D., The CISSP Prep Guide: Mastering the Ten Domains of Computer Security, John Wiley & Sons, 2001, Page 14, Chapter 1: Security Management Practices.

Too much voltage for a short period of time is a spike.

Too much voltage for a long period of time is a surge.

Not enough voltage for a short period of time is a sag or dip

Not enough voltage for a long period of time is brownout

A short power interruption is a fault

A long power interruption is a blackout

You MUST know all of the power issues above for the purpose of the exam.

From: HARRIS, Shon, All-In-One CISSP Certification Exam Guide, 3rd. Edition McGraw-Hill/Osborne, 2005, page 368.

It's interesting to note that the steps to resume normal processing operations will be different than the steps in the recovery plan; that is, the least critical work should be brought back first to the primary site.

My explanation:

at the point where the primary site is ready to receive operations again, less critical systems should be brought back first because one has to make sure that everything will be running smoothly at the primary site before returning critical systems, which are already operating normally at the recovery site.

This will limit the possible interruption of processing to a minimum for most critical systems, thus making it the best option.

Source: KRUTZ, Ronald L. & VINES, Russel D., The CISSP Prep Guide: Mastering the Ten Domains of Computer Security, John Wiley & Sons, 2001, Chapter 8: Business Continuity Planning and Disaster Recovery Planning (page 291).

Layer 5 of the OSI model is the Session Layer. This layer provides a logical persistent connection between peer hosts. A session is analogous to a conversation that is necessary for applications to exchange information.

The session layer is responsible for establishing, managing, and closing end-to-end connections, called sessions, between applications located at different network endpoints. Dialogue control management provided by the session layer includes full-duplex, half-duplex, and simplex communications. Session layer management also helps to ensure that multiple streams of data stay synchronized with each other, as in the case of multimedia applications like video conferencing, and assists with the prevention of application related data errors.

The session layer is responsible for creating, maintaining, and tearing down the session.

Three modes are offered:

(Full) Duplex: Both hosts can exchange information simultaneously, independent of each other.

Half Duplex: Hosts can exchange information, but only one host at a time.

Simplex: Only one host can send information to its peer. Information travels in one direction only.

Another aspect of performance that is worthy of some attention is the mode of operation of the network or connection. Obviously, whenever we connect together device A and device B, there must be some way for A to send to B and B to send to A. Many people don’t realize, however, that networking technologies can differ in terms of how these two directions of communication are handled. Depending on how the network is set up, and the characteristics of the technologies used, performance may be improved through the selection of performance-enhancing modes.

Basic Communication Modes of Operation

Let's begin with a look at the three basic modes of operation that can exist for any network connection, communications channel, or interface.

Simplex Operation

In simplex operation, a network cable or communications channel can only send information in one direction; it's a “one-way street”. This may seem counter-intuitive: what's the point of communications that only travel in one direction? In fact, there are at least two different places where simplex operation is encountered in modern networking.

The first is when two distinct channels are used for communication: one transmits from A to B and the other from B to A. This is surprisingly common, even though not always obvious. For example, most if not all fiber optic communication is simplex, using one strand to send data in each direction. But this may not be obvious if the pair of fiber strands are combined into one cable.

Simplex operation is also used in special types of technologies, especially ones that are asymmetric. For example, one type of satellite Internet access sends data over the satellite only for downloads, while a regular dial-up modem is used for upload to the service provider. In this case, both the satellite link and the dial-up connection are operating in a simplex mode.

Half-Duplex Operation

Technologies that employ half-duplex operation are capable of sending information in both directions between two nodes, but only one direction or the other can be utilized at a time. This is a fairly common mode of operation when there is only a single network medium (cable, radio frequency and so forth) between devices.

While this term is often used to describe the behavior of a pair of devices, it can more generally refer to any number of connected devices that take turns transmitting. For example, in conventional Ethernet networks, any device can transmit, but only one may do so at a time. For this reason, regular (unswitched) Ethernet networks are often said to be “half-duplex”, even though it may seem strange to describe a LAN that way.

Full-Duplex Operation

In full-duplex operation, a connection between two devices is capable of sending data in both directions simultaneously. Full-duplex channels can be constructed either as a pair of simplex links (as described above) or using one channel designed to permit bidirectional simultaneous transmissions. A full-duplex link can only connect two devices, so many such links are required if multiple devices are to be connected together.

Note that the term “full-duplex” is somewhat redundant; “duplex” would suffice, but everyone still says “full-duplex” (likely, to differentiate this mode from half-duplex).

For a listing of protocols associated with Layer 5 of the OSI model, see below:

ADSP - AppleTalk Data Stream Protocol

ASP - AppleTalk Session Protocol

H.245 - Call Control Protocol for Multimedia Communication

ISO-SP

OSI session-layer protocol (X.225, ISO 8327)

iSNS - Internet Storage Name Service

The following are incorrect answers:

Synchronous and Asynchronous are not session layer modes.

Half simplex does not exist. By definition, simplex means that information travels one way only, so half-simplex is a oxymoron.

Reference(s) used for this question:

Hernandez CISSP, Steven (2012-12-21). Official (ISC)2 Guide to the CISSP CBK, Third Edition ((ISC)2 Press) (Kindle Locations 5603-5636). Auerbach Publications. Kindle Edition.

and

http://www.tcpipguide.com/free/t_SimplexFullDuplexandHalfDuplexOperation.htm

and

http://www.wisegeek.com/what-is-a-session-layer.htm

Knowledge-based IDS are more common than behavior-based ID systems.

Source: KRUTZ, Ronald L. & VINES, Russel D., The CISSP Prep Guide: Mastering the Ten Domains of Computer Security, 2001, John Wiley & Sons, Page 63.

Application-Based IDS - "a subset of HIDS that analyze what's going on in an application using the transaction log files of the application." Source: Official ISC2 CISSP CBK Review Seminar Student Manual Version 7.0 p. 87

Host-Based IDS - "an implementation of IDS capabilities at the host level. Its most significant difference from NIDS is intrusion detection analysis, and related processes are limited to the boundaries of the host." Source: Official ISC2 Guide to the CISSP CBK - p. 197

Network-Based IDS - "a network device, or dedicated system attached to the network, that monitors traffic traversing the network segment for which it is integrated." Source: Official ISC2 Guide to the CISSP CBK - p. 196

CISSP for dummies a book that we recommend for a quick overview of the 10 domains has nice and concise coverage of the subject:

Intrusion detection is defined as real-time monitoring and analysis of network activity and data for potential vulnerabilities and attacks in progress. One major limitation of current intrusion detection system (IDS) technologies is the requirement to filter false alarms lest the operator (system or security administrator) be overwhelmed with data. IDSes are classified in many different ways, including active and passive, network-based and host-based, and knowledge-based and behavior-based:

Active and passive IDS

An active IDS (now more commonly known as an intrusion prevention system — IPS) is a system that's configured to automatically block suspected attacks in progress without any intervention required by an operator. IPS has the advantage of providing real-time corrective action in response to an attack but has many disadvantages as well. An IPS must be placed in-line along a network boundary; thus, the IPS itself is susceptible to attack. Also, if false alarms and legitimate traffic haven't been properly identified and filtered, authorized users and applications may be improperly denied access. Finally, the IPS itself may be used to effect a Denial of Service (DoS) attack by intentionally flooding the system with alarms that cause it to block connections until no connections or bandwidth are available.

A passive IDS is a system that's configured only to monitor and analyze network traffic activity and alert an operator to potential vulnerabilities and attacks. It isn't capable of performing any protective or corrective functions on its own. The major advantages of passive IDSes are that these systems can be easily and rapidly deployed and are not normally susceptible to attack themselves.

Network-based and host-based IDS

A network-based IDS usually consists of a network appliance (or sensor) with a Network Interface Card (NIC) operating in promiscuous mode and a separate management interface. The IDS is placed along a network segment or boundary and monitors all traffic on that segment.

A host-based IDS requires small programs (or agents) to be installed on individual systems to be monitored. The agents monitor the operating system and write data to log files and/or trigger alarms. A host-based IDS can only monitor the individual host systems on which the agents are installed; it doesn't monitor the entire network.

Knowledge-based and behavior-based IDS

A knowledge-based (or signature-based) IDS references a database of previous attack profiles and known system vulnerabilities to identify active intrusion attempts. Knowledge-based IDS is currently more common than behavior-based IDS.

Advantages of knowledge-based systems include the following:

It has lower false alarm rates than behavior-based IDS.

Alarms are more standardized and more easily understood than behavior-based IDS.

Disadvantages of knowledge-based systems include these:

Signature database must be continually updated and maintained.

New, unique, or original attacks may not be detected or may be improperly classified.

A behavior-based (or statistical anomaly–based) IDS references a baseline or learned pattern of normal system activity to identify active intrusion attempts. Deviations from this baseline or pattern cause an alarm to be triggered.

Advantages of behavior-based systems include that they

Dynamically adapt to new, unique, or original attacks.

Are less dependent on identifying specific operating system vulnerabilities.

Disadvantages of behavior-based systems include

Higher false alarm rates than knowledge-based IDSes.

Usage patterns that may change often and may not be static enough to implement an effective behavior-based IDS.