OBJ-5.2: Since there are no indications in the IDS logs, the database, or the server, it is most likely that the hacker changed hidden form values to change the items’ price in the shopping cart. A buffer overflow is an anomaly that occurs when a program overruns the buffer’s boundary and overwrites adjacent memory locations while writing data to a buffer. Cross-Site Scripting (XSS) attacks are a type of injection in which malicious scripts are injected into otherwise benign and trusted websites. XSS attacks occur when an attacker uses a web application to send malicious code, generally in a browser side script, to a different end-user. SQL injection is a code injection technique used to attack data-driven applications. Malicious SQL statements are inserted into an entry field for execution, such as dumping the database contents to the attacker.

OBJ-2.2: This code is performing a ping sweep of the subnet 10.1.0.0/24. The code states that for every number in the sequence from 1 to 255, conduct a ping to 10.1.0.x, where x is the number from 1 to 255. When it completes this sequence, it is to return to the terminal prompt (done). The ping command uses an echo request and then receives an echo reply from the ping’s target. A ping sweep does not use an SYN scan, which would require the use of a tool like nmap or hping.

OBJ-3.2: Connection String Parameter Pollution (CSPP) exploits specifically the semicolon-delimited database connection strings that are constructed dynamically based on the user inputs from web applications. CSPP, if carried out successfully, can be used to steal user identities and hijack web credentials. CSPP is a high-risk attack because of the relative ease with which it can be carried out (low access complexity) and the potential results it can have (high impact). Exploit chaining involves multiple commands and exploits being conducted in a series to fully attack or exploit a given target.

OBJ-4.5: A Web Application Firewall (WAF) or Application-Aware Firewall would detect both the accessing of random ports and TLS encryption and identify it as suspicious, whereas Stateless would inspect port number used by the traffic leaving. IDS only analyzes incoming traffic. Therefore it would not be able to see this activity as suspicious.

OBJ-1.1: White box support resources include architectural diagrams, sample application requests, SDK documentation, SOAP project files, Swagger documents, WSDL/WADL, and XML Scheme Definitions (XSD). The PII of employees should not be given to a penetration tester as this could violate laws and regulations regarding maintaining employee data confidentiality and privacy. White-box testing falls on the opposite end of the spectrum from black-box testing, and penetration testers are given full access to source code, architecture documentation, and so forth.

OBJ-5.2: ProxyChains is a tool that allows a penetration tester to pivot to a new subnet, but it must be combined with the modification of the penetration tester’s routing tables on their machine. For example, assume that the exploited client machine is located in the 192.168.5.0/24 subnet, but you need to access a server in the 10.0.0.0/24 subnet. You would then need to “route add 10.0.0.0 255.255.255.0 1” (1 is the ID of your Meterpreter session). Then, you can run “proxychains ” to target the new subnet. For example, “proxychains nmap -sT -Pn -p21,23,25,80,443 10.0.0.5” would perform an nmap scan of the targeted server in the new subnet by chaining the connections together using a proxy on the localhost.

OBJ-5.1: Since the penetration tester has exploited the FTP server from outside the LAN, they will need to set up a route statement in meterpreter. Metasploit makes this very simple since it also has an autoroute meterpreter script that will allow us to attack this second network through our first compromised machine (the FTP server) and then create the routes needed.

OBJ-3.3: An advanced persistent threat (APT) is a network attack in which an unauthorized person gains access to a network and stays there undetected for a long period of time. An APT attack intends to steal data rather than to cause damage to the network or organization. An APT refers to an adversary’s ongoing ability to compromise network security, obtain and maintain access, and use various tools and techniques. They are often supported and funded by nation-states or work directly for a nation-states’ government. Spear phishing is the fraudulent practice of sending emails ostensibly from a known or trusted sender to induce targeted individuals to reveal confidential information. An insider threat is a malicious threat to an organization from people within the organization, such as employees, former employees, contractors, or business associates, who have inside information concerning the organization’s security practices, data, and computer systems. Privilege escalation is the act of exploiting a bug, design flaw, or configuration oversight in an operating system or software application to gain elevated access to resources that are normally protected from an application or user. While an APT may use spear phishing, privilege escalation, or an insider threat to gain access to the system, the scenario presented in this question doesn’t specify what method was used. Therefore, APT is the best answer to select.

OBJ-2.1: DomainKeys Identified Mail (DKIM) provides a cryptographic authentication mechanism. This can replace or supplement SPF. To configure DKIM, the organization uploads a public key as a TXT record in the DNS server. Sender Policy Framework (SPF) uses a DNS record published by an organization hosting an email service. The SPF record identifies the hosts authorized to send email from that domain, and there must be only one per domain. SPF does not provide a cryptographic authentication mechanism like DKIM does, though. The Domain-Based Message Authentication, Reporting, and Conformance (DMARC) framework ensures that SPF and DKIM are being utilized effectively. DMARC relies on DKMI for the cryptographic authentication mechanism, making it the incorrect option for this question. The simple mail transfer protocol (SMTP) is a communication protocol for electronic mail transmission, which does not utilize cryptographic authentication mechanisms by default.

OBJ-6.1: Wired Equivalent Privacy (WEP) is a security protocol, specified in the IEEE Wireless Fidelity (Wi-Fi) standard, 802.11b, that is designed to provide a wireless local area network (WLAN) with a level of security and privacy comparable to what is usually expected of a wired LAN. It is the oldest form of wireless security and the weakest form. WEP can be cracked with brute force techniques in less than 5 minutes with a normal end-user computer.

OBJ-3.2: Cain and Abel is a popular password cracking tool. It can recover many password types using methods such as network packet sniffing, cracking various password hashes by using methods such as dictionary attacks, brute force, and cryptanalysis attacks. It also includes a module to conduct Cisco VPN Client Password Decoding too. CUPP is used to create password lists. Nessus is a vulnerability scanner. The netcat tool is used to create reverse shells for remote access.

OBJ-7.2: Most embedded operating systems use a web interface to access their configurations for setup and installation. Focusing on this web interface and using common web-based exploits is usually one of the best methods of exploiting a device with an embedded OS.

OBJ-6.1: Evil Twin access points are the most common way to perform a man-in-the-middle attack on a wireless network. The evil twin is the wireless LAN equivalent of the phishing scam. This type of attack may be used to steal the passwords of unsuspecting users by monitoring their connections or phishing, which involves setting up a fraudulent web site and luring people there.

OBJ-4.2: Scarcity is used to create a fear in a person of missing out on a special deal or offer. This technique is used in advertising all the time, such as “supplies are limited,” “only available for the next 4 hours”, and other such artificial limitations being used.

OBJ-3.2: The proper syntax for netcat (nc) is -l to signify listening and -p to specify the listening port. Then, the | character allows multiple commands to execute during a single command execution. Next, netcat sends the data to the given IP (192.168.1.76) over port 443. This is a common technique to bypass the firewall by sending traffic over port 443 (a secure SSL/TLS tunnel).

OBJ-7.2: Segmentation is the best method to reduce the risk to an embedded ICS system from a network-based compromise. Additionally, you could disable unused services to reduce the footprint of the embedded ICS. Many of these embedded ICS systems have a large number of default services running. So, by disabling the unused services, we can better secure these devices. By segmenting the devices off the main portion of the network, we can also better protect them. A NIDS might detect an attack or compromise, but it would not reduce the risk of the attack succeeding since it can only detect it. Patching is difficult for embedded ICS devices since they usually rely on customized software applications that rarely provide updates.

OBJ-5.3: Input validation prevents the attacker from sending invalid data to an application and is a strong control against both SQL injection and cross-site scripting attacks. A network layer firewall is a device that is designed to prevent unauthorized access, thereby protecting the computer network. It blocks unauthorized communications into the network and only permits authorized access based on the IP address, ports, and protocols in use. Cross-site request forgery (CSRF) is another attack type. A hypervisor controls access between virtual machines.

OBJ-2.1: Passive reconnaissance combines publicly available data from various sources about an organization and does not use active scanning or data gathering methods. Vulnerability scanning is an inspection of the potential points of exploitation on a computer or network to identify security holes. A vulnerability scan is usually conducted to detect and classify system weaknesses in computers, networks, and communications equipment and predict the effectiveness of countermeasures. Patch management is the process that helps acquire, test, and install multiple patches (code changes) on existing applications and software tools on a computer, enabling systems to stay updated on existing patches and determining which patches are the appropriate ones.

OBJ-2.1: The best course of action is to perform a DNS brute-force attack. The DNS brute-force attack queries a list of IPs and typically bypasses IDS/IPS systems that do not alert on DNS queries. A ping sweep or a stealth scan can be easily detected by the IPS, depending on the signatures and settings being used. A DNS zone transfer is also something that often has a signature search for it and will be alerted upon since it is a common attack technique.

OBJ-6.1: The most prominent attack against WPS enabled wireless networks involves brute-forcing the 8-digit PIN that client uses to enroll their devices without knowing the pre-shared key. WPS checks each half of the PIN individually, reducing the number of possible combinations from a maximum of 100,000,000 to only 11,000. This only takes a few minutes to crack on most modern computers, as long as the WAP doesn’t have a lockout after a certain number of failures. The lockout mechanism may also be triggered based on the client’s MAC, so you can often spoof MAC to bypass this defense.

OBJ-3.3: An advanced persistent threat (APT) is a type of attacker that keeps a low profile while infiltrating a remote network. Once inside the network, they maintain their patience while gathering intelligence and slowly exfiltrating data out of the network. Many APTs work for a nation-state and focus on intelligence operations. Some APTs also perform corporate espionage to steal highly guarded trade secrets from competitors. APTs commonly use several attack vectors to ensure their success in gaining unauthorized access to information.

OBJ-4.1: The man-in-the-middle attack intercepts communications between two systems. For example, in an HTTP transaction, the target is the TCP connection between client and server. Using different techniques, the attacker splits the original TCP connection into 2 new connections, one between the client and the attacker and the other between the attacker and the server. This often uses IP spoofing to trick a victim into connecting to the attack. SQL injection is a code injection technique used to attack data-driven applications. Malicious SQL statements are inserted into an entry field for execution, such as dumping the database contents to the attacker. A man-in-the-middle attack (MITM) is an attack where the attacker secretly relays and possibly alters the communications between two parties who believe that they are directly communicating with each other. ARP Poisoning, also known as ARP Spoofing, is a type of cyber attack carried out over a Local Area Network (LAN) that involves sending malicious ARP packets to a default gateway on a LAN to change the pairings in its IP to MAC address table. Cross-Site Scripting (XSS) attacks are a type of injection in which malicious scripts are injected into otherwise benign and trusted websites. XSS attacks occur when an attacker uses a web application to send malicious code, generally in a browser side script, to a different end-user.

OBJ-3.2: There are several net command utilities that you can use to view and configure shared resources on a Windows network. The net user command allows system administrators to manage user accounts on Windows PCs. You can use the command to display account information or make changes to user accounts. It can be used, among other things, to enable the inactive administrator account of a Windows system.

OBJ-2.3: Port 427 is used by SLP. The Service Location Protocol (SLP) is a protocol or method of organizing and locating the resources (such as printers, disk drives, databases, e-mail directories, and schedulers) in a network. This is an alternative protocol to LDAP in newer networks. While you may not have this port memorized, you should have memorized ports 389, 443, and 445 and identified that they were not associated with printers.

OBJ-1.1: Passively harvesting information from a target is the main purpose of the reconnaissance phase. Harvesting email addresses from the public internet, identifying employees on social media (particularly LinkedIn profiles), discovering public-facing servers, and gathering other publicly available information can allow an attacker to develop a more thorough understanding of a targeted organization. Acquiring or developing zero-day exploits, selecting backdoor implants, and choosing command and control (C2) mechanisms will require the information gathered during reconnaissance to be effective. Still, these activities will actually occur during the weaponization phase.

OBJ-2.1: The nslookup command is used for DNS (Domain Name System) lookup operations. It is used to find the IP address of a particular domain name or the domain name of a particular IP address. Host and dig are also commands that can be used to lookup a domain name and convert it to an IP address within a Linux system.

OBJ-4.1: Wireless access points can utilize MAC filtering to ensure only known network interface cards are allowed to connect to the network. If the hacker changes their MAC address to a trusted MAC address, they can easily bypass this security mechanism. MAC filtering is considered a good security practice as part of a larger defense-in-depth strategy, but it won’t stop a skilled hacker for long. MAC addresses are permanently burned into the network interface card by the manufacturer and serve as the device’s physical address. WEP is the Wired Equivalent Privacy encryption standard, which is considered obsolete in modern wireless networks. WEP can be broken using a brute force attack within just a few minutes by an attacker. Another security technique is to disable the SSID broadcast of an access point. While this prevents the SSID broadcast, a skilled attacker can still find the SSID using discovery scanning techniques. WPS is the WiFi Protected Setup. WPS is used to connect and configure wireless devices to an access point easily.

OBJ-4.3: A botnet is many internet-connected devices, each of which is running one or more bots. Botnets can be used to perform distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attacks, steal data, send spam, and allow the attacker to access the device and its connection. A zombie (also known as a bot) is a computer or workstation that a remote attacker has accessed and set up to forward transmissions (including spam and viruses) to other computers on the internet.

OBJ-8.1: Community Cloud is another type of cloud computing in which the cloud setup is shared manually among different organizations that belong to the same community or area. A multi-tenant setup is developed using cloud among different organizations belonging to a particular community or group with similar computing concerns. For joint business organizations, ventures, research organizations, and tenders, a community cloud is an appropriate solution. Based on the description of 15 member banks coming together to create the CloudBank organization and its cloud computing environment, a community cloud model is most likely described.

OBJ-9.1: AES, PKCS, and SSL/TLS are all compatible with x.509 and can be used in a wide variety of functions and purposes. AES is used for symmetric encryption. PKCS is used as a digital signature algorithm. SSL/TLS is used for secure key exchange.

OBJ-1.1: This security approach provides a defense layer that makes it difficult for unauthorized users to break into a system. It provides multiple factors that a user must know to obtain access. For instance, if one factor is successfully broken, there will be few others that the individual attempting to enter the system must overcome.

OBJ-4.5: Due to the requirement to allow a single remote IP to enter the firewall, the permit statement must start with a single IP in the Untrusted (Internet) zone. Based on the options provided, only 143.27.43.32 could be correct. Next, the destination is a single server in the DMZ, so only 161.212.71.14 could be correct. The destination port should be 3389, which is the port for the Remote Desktop Protocol. Combining these three facts, only “permit 143.27.43.32 161.212.71.14 RDP 3389” could be correct.

OBJ-5.2: This is a post request to run the “cat /etc/passwd” command from an outside source. It is not known from the evidence provided if this command were successful or not, but it should be analyzed further as this is not what would be expected, normal traffic. While the browser’s default language was configured for Chinese (zh), this is easily changed and cannot be used to draw authoritative conclusions about the threat actor’s true location or persona. The User-Agent used is listed as Mozilla, which is used by both Firefox and Google Chrome. For an in-depth analysis of the full attack this code snippet was taken from, please visit https://www.rsa.com/content/dam/en/solution-brief/asoc-threat-solution-series-webshells.pdf. This 6-page article is definitely worth your time to look over and learn how a remote access web shell is used as an exploit.

OBJ-8.1: Virtual machine escape vulnerabilities are the most severe issue that may exist in a virtualized environment. In this attack, the attacker can access a single virtual host and then leverages that access to intrude on the resources assigned to different virtual machines. Data remnant is the residual representation of digital data that remains even after attempts have been made to remove or erase it. Virtualization sprawl is a phenomenon that occurs when the number of virtual machines on a network reaches a point where the administrator can no longer manage them effectively. Virtual machine migration is the task of moving a virtual machine from one physical hardware environment to another.

OBJ-4.5: An intrusion detection system is a device or software application that monitors a network or system for malicious activity or policy violations. Any malicious activity or violation is typically reported to an administrator or collected centrally using a security information and event management system. Unlike an IPS, which can stop malicious activity or policy violations, an IDS can only log these issues and not stop them.

OBJ-1.1: Multi-factor authentication (MFA) creates multiple security layers to help increase the confidence that the user requesting access is who they claim to be by requiring two distinct factors for authentication. These factors can be something you know (knowledge factor), something you have (possession factor), something you are (inheritance factor), something you do (action factor), or somewhere you are (location factor). By selecting a smartcard (something you have) and a PIN (something you know), you have implemented multi-factor authentication. Choosing a fingerprint and retinal scan would instead use only one factor (inheritance). Choosing a username, password, and security question would also be only using one factor (knowledge). For something to be considered multi-factor, you need items from at least two different authentication factor categories: knowledge, possession, inheritance, location, or action.

OBJ-7.1: Data loss prevention software detects potential data breaches/data ex-filtration transmissions and prevents them by monitoring, detecting, and blocking sensitive data while in use (endpoint actions), in-motion (network traffic), and at rest (data storage). Since the user was an authorized user (employee), changing your password policy, reconfiguring the firewall, or setting up an MDM solution would not solve this problem. Instead, a DLP solution must be implemented.

OBJ-3.1: These results from the vulnerability scan conducted shows an enumeration of open Windows shares on an Apache server. The enumeration results show three share names (print$, files, Temp) were found using a null session connection. There is no associated CVE with this vulnerability, but it is not a false positive. Not all vulnerabilities have a CVE associated with them. Nothing in this output indicates anything concerning Windows Defender, so this is not the correct answer. Bugtraq IDs are a different type of identification number issued for vulnerabilities by SecurityFocus. Generally, if there is a CVE, there will also be a Bugtraq ID. Both the CVE and Bugtraq ID being blank is not suspicious since we are dealing with a null enumeration result.

OBJ-9.1: Non-repudiation occurs when a sender cannot claim they didn’t send an email when they did. A digital signature should be attached to each email sent to achieve non-repudiation. This digital signature is comprised of a digital hash of the email’s contents, and then encrypting that digital hash using the sender’s private key. The receiver can then unencrypt the digital hash using the sender’s public key to verify the message’s integrity.

OBJ-7.1: To ensure the data remains confidential and is not accessed by the thief, Tim should perform a remote wipe of the device from the MDM. This will ensure any corporate data is erased before anyone accessing it. Additionally, Tim could reset the device’s password, but if the thief can guess or crack the password, they would have access to the data. Identifying the smartphone’s IP address is not a useful step in protecting the data on the device. Additionally, devices should be encrypted BEFORE they are lost or stolen, not after. Therefore, the option to remotely encrypt the device is provided as a wrong answer and a distractor.

OBJ-4.1: RDP is the protocol for the Remote Desktop Protocol and operates over port 3389. This is not used in a typical VoIP system. SIP (Session Initiation Protocol), H.323 (voice/video conferencing) protocol, and the RTP (Real-time Transport Protocol) are all used heavily in VoIP and video conferencing solutions.

OBJ-3.1: When conducting a vulnerability scan, it is common for the report to include some findings that are classified as “low” priority or “for informational purposes only.” These are most likely false positives and can be ignored by the analyst when starting their remediation efforts. “An HTTPS entry that indicates the web page is securely encrypted” is not a false positive but a true negative (a non-issue). A scan result showing a different version from the automated asset inventory should be investigated and is likely a true positive. A finding that shows the scanner compliance plug-ins are not up-to-date would likely also be a true positive that should be investigated.

OBJ-2.2: There are several ways to answer this question, even if you don’t remember ever piece of the NMAP syntax. First, the question asks you to scan a Class B network, and if we want to scan the entire Class B, we would have to scan a /16. This removed two of our four choices. Now, considering the last two choices, we have a major differences: only one of these options would provide operating system detection (-O).

OBJ-2.2: The –O switch is used to tell nmap to conduct fingerprinting of the operating system based on the responses received during scanning. Nmap will then report on the suspected operating system of the scanned host. If you use –O –v, you will get additional details, as this runs the operating system scan in verbose mode. The -OS flag is made up and not supported by nmap. The -s0 flag conducts an IP protocol scan of the target. The -sP flag conducts a simple ping scan against the target.

OBJ-3.2: Missing patches are the most common vulnerability found on both Windows and Linux systems. When a security patch is released, attackers begin to reverse engineer the security patch to exploit the vulnerability. If your servers are not patched against the vulnerability, they can become victims of the exploit, and the server’s data can become compromised. Cross-Site Scripting (XSS) attacks are a type of injection in which malicious scripts are injected into otherwise benign and trusted websites. Cross-site scripting focuses on exploiting a user’s workstation, not a server. CRLF injection is a software application coding vulnerability that occurs when an attacker injects a CRLF character sequence where it is not expected. SQL injection is the placement of malicious code in SQL statements via web page input. SQL is commonly used against databases, but they are not useful when attacking file servers.

OBJ-2.2: Port 3389 is an RDP port used for the Remote Desktop Protocol. If this port isn’t supposed to be opened, then an incident response plan should be the next step since this can be used for remote access by an attacker. MySQL runs on port 3306. LDAP runs on port 389. IMAP over SSL runs on port 993.

OBJ-3.1: The Common Vulnerabilities and Exposures (CVE) system provides a reference-method for publicly known information-security vulnerabilities and exposures. XCCDF (extensible configuration checklist description format) is a language that is used in creating checklists for reporting results. The Common Configuration Enumeration (CCE) provides unique identifiers to system configuration issues to facilitate fast and accurate correlation of configuration data across multiple information sources and tools. Common Platform Enumeration (CPE) is a standardized method of describing and identifying classes of applications, operating systems, and hardware devices present among an enterprise’s computing assets.

OBJ-8.1: Installing a jumpbox as a single point of entry for the administration of servers within the cloud is the best choice for this requirement. The jumpbox only runs the necessary administrative port and protocol (typically SSH). Administrators connect to the jumpbox then use the jumpbox to connect to the admin interface on the application server. The application server’s admin interface has a single entry in its ACL (the jumpbox) and denies any other hosts’ connection attempts. A bastion host is a special-purpose computer on a network specifically designed and configured to withstand attacks. The computer generally hosts a single application. For example, a proxy server and all other services are removed or limited to reduce the threat to the computer. An airgap system is a network or single host computer with unique security requirements that may physically be separated from any other network. Physical separation would prevent a system from accessing the remote administration interface directly and require an airgap system to reach the private cloud.

OBJ-3.1: There are two reasonable choices presented: (1) the vulnerability assessment scan is returning a false positive, or (2) this critical patch did not remediate the vulnerability. It is impossible to know which is based on the description in the question. If the patch was installed successfully, as the question states, then it is possible that the critical patch was coded incorrectly and did not actually remediate the vulnerability. While most operating system vendors test their patches before release to prevent this, they are sometimes rushed into production with extremely critical patches. The patch does not actually remediate the vulnerability on all systems. When this occurs, the vendor will issue a subsequent patch to fix it and supersede the original patch. The other option is that the vulnerability assessment tool is incorrectly configured and is returning a false positive. This can occur when the signature used to detect the vulnerability is too specific or too generic to actually detect whether the system was patched for the vulnerability or not. The other options are incorrect, as you do not have to wait a certain period of time after installation before scanning. It is assumed that you are scanning the same IP range both times as you have verified your scan configuration.

OBJ-7.2: A real-time operating system (RTOS) is a special type of embedded OS. An RTOS ideal for embedded systems because they tend to have strict requirements for when a task should be completed and do not have particularly taxing workloads. An RTOS uses a predictable and consistent scheduler, unlike a general-purpose OS like Windows or macOS.