Re: [SC-L] bumper sticker slogan for secure software
Sorry, but it is a fact. Yes, you can have provably correct code. Cost is approximately $20,000 per line of code. That is what the procedures required for correct code cost. Oh, and they are kind of super-linear, so one program of 200 lines costs more than 2 programs of 100 lines. Someone already pointed this out but your numbers here have no basis. Provide references or something, otherwise they are meaningless. This isn't as true and as wide spread as you make it sound. Consider, for example, SQL Injection. Assuming I do not upgrade my database, and do not change my code and server (i.e. do not change my environment at all), then if I have prevented this attack initially nothing new will come up to suddenly make it work. Indeed, consider SQL injection attacks. They didn't exist 5 years ago, Prove it. because no one had thought of them. Same with XSS bugs. Again prove it. I might say that they didn't exist at a given time because apps that were affected weren't widely deployed. Online BBS's are relatively new, and that, to my memory, was the first place for XSS bugs. What Dana is trying to tell you is that some time in the next year or so, someone is going to discover yet another of these major vulnerability classes that no one has thought of before. At that point, a lot of code that was thought to be reasonably secure suddenly is vulnerable. Right, but if your environment is unchanged and you've looked at all angles, then you will not be affected. Note that I'm not saying it's easy, but .. Not true; you can call other libraries happily and with confidence if you handle the case of them going all kinds of wrong. This also is false. Consider the JPG bug that badly 0wned Microsoft desktops a while back. It was a bug in an image processing library. You try to view an image by processing it with the library, and the result is that the attacker can execute arbitrary code in your process. That is pretty difficult to defensively program against. Why? Crispin -- mic ___ Secure Coding mailing list (SC-L) SC-L@securecoding.org List information, subscriptions, etc - http://krvw.com/mailman/listinfo/sc-l List charter available at - http://www.securecoding.org/list/charter.php
Re: [SC-L] bumper sticker slogan for secure software
Actually, Brian Shea got the points for emailing me that he knew it was the system error Access Denied. An extra 10 points goes to Andrew van der Stock for his explaination that: apparently the term originates from radio, where 5x5 means good reception and good signal strength (in that order). So 0x5 means - no reception (0) - good signal strength (5) ie, we're doing ok at getting our message out, but people aren't listening yet. That cracked me up. So fitting for this forum. Regards, Dana Epp [Microsoft Security MVP] http://silverstr.ufies.org/blog/ -Original Message- From: mikeiscool [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Thursday, July 20, 2006 3:25 PM To: Wall, Kevin Cc: Dana Epp; SC-L@securecoding.org Subject: Re: [SC-L] bumper sticker slogan for secure software BTW, does anyone besides me think that it's time to put this thread to rest? I do. But i'm still waiting for my points from dana ... -kevin -- mic ___ Secure Coding mailing list (SC-L) SC-L@securecoding.org List information, subscriptions, etc - http://krvw.com/mailman/listinfo/sc-l List charter available at - http://www.securecoding.org/list/charter.php
Re: [SC-L] bumper sticker slogan for secure software
What is important is that some magic formal tool could say that some code in language A, where bug of type k is possible, is not equivalent to the version in language B, where type k bugs are impossible, ergo you have found a type k bug (in the absence of any other bug in that section of code...). Well, no. You know that a bug exists. It could be in one version (you don't know which one), or it could be in the verifier. If you assume that the verifier is bug-free, and you assume that the language-A version is semantically correct, then you know that a bug exists in the language-B version. It might be of type k or it might be of some other type (possibly a type that can exist in language A, possibly not). And in any case, you have not found it; you have only demonstrated its existence. /~\ The ASCII der Mouse \ / Ribbon Campaign X Against HTML [EMAIL PROTECTED] / \ Email! 7D C8 61 52 5D E7 2D 39 4E F1 31 3E E8 B3 27 4B ___ Secure Coding mailing list (SC-L) SC-L@securecoding.org List information, subscriptions, etc - http://krvw.com/mailman/listinfo/sc-l List charter available at - http://www.securecoding.org/list/charter.php
Re: [SC-L] bumper sticker slogan for secure software
On 7/21/06, Dana Epp [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: yeah. but none of this changes the fact that it IS possible to write completely secure code. -- mic And it IS possible that a man will walk on Mars someday. But its not practical or realistic in the society we live in today. I'm sorry mic, but I have to disagree with you here. It is EXTREMELY difficult to have code be 100% correct if an application has any level of real use or complexity. There will be security defects. Why? Why accept this as a fact? It is not a fact. If you put procedures in place and appropriately review and test you can be confident. The weakest link here is the human factor, and people make mistakes. Yes they do. So help them to stop it by teaching and testing and reviewing. More importantly, threats are constantly evolving and what you may consider completely secure today may not be tomorrow when a new attack vector is recognized that may attack your software. This isn't as true and as wide spread as you make it sound. Consider, for example, SQL Injection. Assuming I do not upgrade my database, and do not change my code and server (i.e. do not change my environment at all), then if I have prevented this attack initially nothing new will come up to suddenly make it work. If the environment IS changed, however, then of course it's expected that the program should be reviewed and checked again. And unless you wrote every single line of code yourself without calling out to ANY libraries, you cannot rely on the security of other libraries or components that may NOT have the same engineering discipline that you may have on your own code base. Not true; you can call other libraries happily and with confidence if you handle the case of them going all kinds of wrong. Ross Anderson once said that secure software engineering is about building systems to remain dependable in the face of malice, error, or mischance. I think he has something there. If we build systems to maintain confidentiality, integrity and availability, we have the ability to fail gracefully in a manner to recover from unknown or changing problems in our software without being detrimental to the user, or their data. I don't think we should ever stop striving to reach secure coding nirvana. But I also understand that in the real world we are still in our infancy when it comes to secure software as a discipline, and we still have much to learn before we will reach it. Yes, Much to learn. Like the fact that it _is_ reachable if you believe you can reach it. And, you know, study yoga and live in a cliff for a few years. Regards, Dana Epp [Microsoft Security MVP] http://silverstr.ufies.org/blog/ -- mic ___ Secure Coding mailing list (SC-L) SC-L@securecoding.org List information, subscriptions, etc - http://krvw.com/mailman/listinfo/sc-l List charter available at - http://www.securecoding.org/list/charter.php
Re: [SC-L] bumper sticker slogan for secure software
I've actually been using a secure software slogan for a few years, both in teaching and in pitching business. It's taken from Howard and LeBlanc's book Writing Secure Code: - Security features are not secure features - The statement mesmerizes people and aguably needs a necessarily to be more precise. But it's short and does the trick for me---it separates adding security functions from trying to secure all functions in the system (during all phases). Regards, John John Wilander, PhD Student Computer and Information Sc. Linkoping University, Sweden http://www.ida.liu.se/~johwi ___ Secure Coding mailing list (SC-L) SC-L@securecoding.org List information, subscriptions, etc - http://krvw.com/mailman/listinfo/sc-l List charter available at - http://www.securecoding.org/list/charter.php
Re: [SC-L] bumper sticker slogan for secure software
There's another point to consider, when talking about whether True Security is Possible. And I have to say I've never been happy with the forms I've found so far to express it... Security, in many cases, decays. It's like what we used to call, in the Old Days, bit rot. Software that has worked perfectly well for years (that is, failures and mistakes have fallen under the threshold of detection) suddenly stop working. Often, it's because some element of the environment in which the system runs has changed around it. It could be a library that the program uses, for instance. I suppose it could be a change in the way the software is used, or applied. So while most software decays in some way while it ages, I seem to observe that the security aspect of a program decays faster than the rest of it. (This has some analogies in the real world. Some parts of a car, for example, wear out faster than the rest. Tires and Brake pads. It's an interesting feature of good design, of course, to isolate the effects of wear and tear into parts intended to be disposable. But I digress.) I have therefore often wondered if we should be talking, not about how secure a system is, in a static sense, but rather what its security half-life is. This is the point of my hoary thought experiment (sorry if you've heard this one) in which we prepare a desktop with the latest and greatest in the way of anti-virus stuff, firewalls, OS patches, and so forth, then spin it down, shrink-wrap it, and put it in a closet. If we take it out a year later and spin it up, that system will be less sure--more likely to successfully be compromised--than it was when it was spun down. How fast security decays will vary, depending mostly on which OS and app software it runs and how corrosive, if you will, that part of the overall operating landscape (the Internet, say) is. This reasoning leads me to the thought that Mac OS X, for example, is more secure than Windows XP for reasons having nothing directly to do with design or implementation, but rather pertaining to its very ubiquity. XP, in this sense, is the center of the bullseye. Gee, maybe software systems emanate a modicum of unsecurity gravity, so that if you get a great many of them together (that is, if millions and millions of people buy the product), security plummets, and declines as the square of the distance to True Dead Center of the day's commonplace platform. Or, to put it another way, this is why XP sucks. Well, I said I've never been happy with the way I've expressed this. -mg- - Original Message - From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: sc-l@securecoding.org Sent: Friday, July 21, 2006 5:05 AM Subject: SC-L Digest, Vol 2, Issue 124 Send SC-L mailing list submissions to sc-l@securecoding.org To subscribe or unsubscribe via the World Wide Web, visit http://krvw.com/mailman/listinfo/sc-l or, via email, send a message with subject or body 'help' to [EMAIL PROTECTED] You can reach the person managing the list at [EMAIL PROTECTED] When replying, please edit your Subject line so it is more specific than Re: Contents of SC-L digest... Today's Topics: 1. Re: bumper sticker slogan for secure software (Pascal Meunier) 2. Re: bumper sticker slogan for secure software ([EMAIL PROTECTED]) 3. Re: bumper sticker slogan for secure software (Florian Weimer) 4. Re: bumper sticker slogan for secure software (Pascal Meunier) 5. Re: bumper sticker slogan for secure software (ljknews) 6. Re: bumper sticker slogan for secure software (Pascal Meunier) 7. Re: bumper sticker slogan for secure software (ljknews) 8. Re: bumper sticker slogan for secure software (Dana Epp) 9. Re: bumper sticker slogan for secure software (John Wilander) -- Message: 1 Date: Thu, 20 Jul 2006 15:11:06 -0400 From: Pascal Meunier [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: Re: [SC-L] bumper sticker slogan for secure software To: Gary McGraw [EMAIL PROTECTED], Florian Weimer [EMAIL PROTECTED], der Mouse [EMAIL PROTECTED] Cc: SC-L@securecoding.org Message-ID: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1 On 7/20/06 1:57 PM, Gary McGraw [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: I'm afraid that's not true. John Knight has a famous paper that shows that design/requirements bugs persist in n-version programming paradigms. I'll let the interested people google that one up for themselves. gem But it's true for stupid bugs like buffer overflows and format string vulnerabilities, in which we're still swimming, and the proof is the fact that those aren't possible in some languages. For design/requirements bugs, I'm reading: Why Are Formal Methods Not Used More Widely? John C. Knight Colleen L. DeJong Matthew S. Gibble Lu?s G. Nakano Department of Computer Science University of Virginia Charlottesville, VA 22903 http://www.cs.virginia.edu/~jck/publications/lfm.97.pdf
Re: [SC-L] bumper sticker slogan for secure software
On 7/20/06, Andrew van der Stock [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Actually, it is a myth. For every non-trivial system, there are business pressures on resourcing, deadlines, and acceptable quality (pick any two). Once a business has set their taste for risk, it makes no sense to spend say $10m on security controls on a product and delay it for six months which may only bring in $2m in revenue in total, or none at all if the company runs out of money to bring it to market. At the moment, most companies neither accept or assign the risk, enumerate the risk correctly, nor take adequate steps to eliminate as much risk as possible. We need to improve all three aspects. Even in a perfect world, there will still be bugs and security defects. Let's make sure that the remaining ones are really hard to exploit, and when the exploit happens, not much loss occurs. yeah. but none of this changes the fact that it IS possible to write completely secure code. thanks, Andrew -- mic ___ Secure Coding mailing list (SC-L) SC-L@securecoding.org List information, subscriptions, etc - http://krvw.com/mailman/listinfo/sc-l List charter available at - http://www.securecoding.org/list/charter.php
Re: [SC-L] bumper sticker slogan for secure software
yeah. but none of this changes the fact that it IS possible to write completely secure code. -- mic And it IS possible that a man will walk on Mars someday. But its not practical or realistic in the society we live in today. I'm sorry mic, but I have to disagree with you here. It is EXTREMELY difficult to have code be 100% correct if an application has any level of real use or complexity. There will be security defects. The weakest link here is the human factor, and people make mistakes. More importantly, threats are constantly evolving and what you may consider completely secure today may not be tomorrow when a new attack vector is recognized that may attack your software. And unless you wrote every single line of code yourself without calling out to ANY libraries, you cannot rely on the security of other libraries or components that may NOT have the same engineering discipline that you may have on your own code base. Ross Anderson once said that secure software engineering is about building systems to remain dependable in the face of malice, error, or mischance. I think he has something there. If we build systems to maintain confidentiality, integrity and availability, we have the ability to fail gracefully in a manner to recover from unknown or changing problems in our software without being detrimental to the user, or their data. I don't think we should ever stop striving to reach secure coding nirvana. But I also understand that in the real world we are still in our infancy when it comes to secure software as a discipline, and we still have much to learn before we will reach it. Regards, Dana Epp [Microsoft Security MVP] http://silverstr.ufies.org/blog/ ___ Secure Coding mailing list (SC-L) SC-L@securecoding.org List information, subscriptions, etc - http://krvw.com/mailman/listinfo/sc-l List charter available at - http://www.securecoding.org/list/charter.php
Re: [SC-L] bumper sticker slogan for secure software
* der Mouse: Absolute security is a myth. As is designing absolutely secure software. I have high hopes in formal methods. All formal methods do is push bugs around. Basically, you end up writing in a higher-level language (the spec you are formally verifying the program meets). You are then subject to the bugs present in *that* program (the spec) and the bugs present in the compiler (the formal verifier). But people are forced to spend more time with the code, which generally helps them (in particular smart people) to eradicate bugs. Another way to achieve the same thing is to freeze the code base and let it mature over decades, but I don't see the business model for that. ___ Secure Coding mailing list (SC-L) SC-L@securecoding.org List information, subscriptions, etc - http://krvw.com/mailman/listinfo/sc-l List charter available at - http://www.securecoding.org/list/charter.php
Re: [SC-L] bumper sticker slogan for secure software
Dana, Regarding your remarks about writing perfectly secure code... well put. And your remarks about Ross Anderson... Ross Anderson once said that secure software engineering is about building systems to remain dependable in the face of malice, error, or mischance. I think he has something there. If we build systems to maintain confidentiality, integrity and availability, we have the ability to fail gracefully in a manner to recover from unknown or changing problems in our software without being detrimental to the user, or their data. remined me of Anderson and Ralph Needham coining the phrase (hope I'm getting this right) that security is like programming Satan's computer in the sense that you have an evil extremely intelligent adversary with unlimited resources and time, etc. [http://www.cl.cam.ac.uk/ftp/users/rja14/satan.pdf] So there's a bumper sticker for you: Security: programming Satan's computer Of course, it's likely to be misunderstood by most. (Maybe we could attribute it to SNL's church lady. Sorry Ross. ;-) BTW, does anyone besides me think that it's time to put this thread to rest? -kevin --- Kevin W. Wall Qwest Information Technology, Inc. [EMAIL PROTECTED] Phone: 614.215.4788 The reason you have people breaking into your software all over the place is because your software sucks... -- Former whitehouse cybersecurity advisor, Richard Clarke, at eWeek Security Summit This communication is the property of Qwest and may contain confidential or privileged information. Unauthorized use of this communication is strictly prohibited and may be unlawful. If you have received this communication in error, please immediately notify the sender by reply e-mail and destroy all copies of the communication and any attachments. ___ Secure Coding mailing list (SC-L) SC-L@securecoding.org List information, subscriptions, etc - http://krvw.com/mailman/listinfo/sc-l List charter available at - http://www.securecoding.org/list/charter.php
Re: [SC-L] bumper sticker slogan for secure software
On 7/20/06 11:58 AM, Florian Weimer [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: * der Mouse: Absolute security is a myth. As is designing absolutely secure software. I have high hopes in formal methods. All formal methods do is push bugs around. Basically, you end up writing in a higher-level language (the spec you are formally verifying the program meets). You are then subject to the bugs present in *that* program (the spec) and the bugs present in the compiler (the formal verifier). But people are forced to spend more time with the code, which generally helps them (in particular smart people) to eradicate bugs. Another way to achieve the same thing is to freeze the code base and let it mature over decades, but I don't see the business model for that. Also, writing it twice with different languages, especially at different levels of abstraction, makes it less likely that the same bugs will appear in both. You can choose the higher level language so that it has great expressive power exactly for the things that are a pain to capture and verify (and thus a source of bugs) in the lower-level language. Last time I checked, formal methods were even able to catch design errors in some networking protocols. But you're right, they are not absolutely perfect because the tools and operators aren't, etc... That doesn't mean they can't help a great deal. I have great hopes for their usefulness. Maybe some day they will help so much that the distinction between what they can produce and absolutely secure software will become too small to matter. Whether we'll still be alive when that happens is another question. Pascal ___ Secure Coding mailing list (SC-L) SC-L@securecoding.org List information, subscriptions, etc - http://krvw.com/mailman/listinfo/sc-l List charter available at - http://www.securecoding.org/list/charter.php
Re: [SC-L] bumper sticker slogan for secure software
I'm afraid that's not true. John Knight has a famous paper that shows that design/requirements bugs persist in n-version programming paradigms. I'll let the interested people google that one up for themselves. gem company www.cigital.com. podcast www.cigital.com/silverbullet book www.swsec.com -Original Message- From: Pascal Meunier [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Thu Jul 20 13:54:42 2006 To: Florian Weimer; der Mouse Cc: SC-L@securecoding.org Subject:Re: [SC-L] bumper sticker slogan for secure software On 7/20/06 11:58 AM, Florian Weimer [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: * der Mouse: Absolute security is a myth. As is designing absolutely secure software. I have high hopes in formal methods. All formal methods do is push bugs around. Basically, you end up writing in a higher-level language (the spec you are formally verifying the program meets). You are then subject to the bugs present in *that* program (the spec) and the bugs present in the compiler (the formal verifier). But people are forced to spend more time with the code, which generally helps them (in particular smart people) to eradicate bugs. Another way to achieve the same thing is to freeze the code base and let it mature over decades, but I don't see the business model for that. Also, writing it twice with different languages, especially at different levels of abstraction, makes it less likely that the same bugs will appear in both. You can choose the higher level language so that it has great expressive power exactly for the things that are a pain to capture and verify (and thus a source of bugs) in the lower-level language. Last time I checked, formal methods were even able to catch design errors in some networking protocols. But you're right, they are not absolutely perfect because the tools and operators aren't, etc... That doesn't mean they can't help a great deal. I have great hopes for their usefulness. Maybe some day they will help so much that the distinction between what they can produce and absolutely secure software will become too small to matter. Whether we'll still be alive when that happens is another question. Pascal ___ Secure Coding mailing list (SC-L) SC-L@securecoding.org List information, subscriptions, etc - http://krvw.com/mailman/listinfo/sc-l List charter available at - http://www.securecoding.org/list/charter.php This electronic message transmission contains information that may be confidential or privileged. The information contained herein is intended solely for the recipient and use by any other party is not authorized. If you are not the intended recipient (or otherwise authorized to receive this message by the intended recipient), any disclosure, copying, distribution or use of the contents of the information is prohibited. If you have received this electronic message transmission in error, please contact the sender by reply email and delete all copies of this message. Cigital, Inc. accepts no responsibility for any loss or damage resulting directly or indirectly from the use of this email or its contents. Thank You. ___ Secure Coding mailing list (SC-L) SC-L@securecoding.org List information, subscriptions, etc - http://krvw.com/mailman/listinfo/sc-l List charter available at - http://www.securecoding.org/list/charter.php
Re: [SC-L] bumper sticker slogan for secure software
On 7/20/06 1:57 PM, Gary McGraw [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: I'm afraid that's not true. John Knight has a famous paper that shows that design/requirements bugs persist in n-version programming paradigms. I'll let the interested people google that one up for themselves. gem But it's true for stupid bugs like buffer overflows and format string vulnerabilities, in which we're still swimming, and the proof is the fact that those aren't possible in some languages. For design/requirements bugs, I'm reading: Why Are Formal Methods Not Used More Widely? John C. Knight Colleen L. DeJong Matthew S. Gibble Luís G. Nakano Department of Computer Science University of Virginia Charlottesville, VA 22903 http://www.cs.virginia.edu/~jck/publications/lfm.97.pdf and the evidence is that engineers presented with formal specifications were able to spot many design errors (Validation by inspection was effective). Therefore if you have a formal, high-level version it can be validated better, and formal methods give proof that the lower-level code conforms. I call that all-around better, and I'm hoping for more of it and better ways to do it. Now if you order a cat and needed a dog, nobody can help you. Pascal -Original Message- From: Pascal Meunier [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Thu Jul 20 13:54:42 2006 To: Florian Weimer; der Mouse Cc: SC-L@securecoding.org Subject: Re: [SC-L] bumper sticker slogan for secure software On 7/20/06 11:58 AM, Florian Weimer [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: * der Mouse: Absolute security is a myth. As is designing absolutely secure software. I have high hopes in formal methods. All formal methods do is push bugs around. Basically, you end up writing in a higher-level language (the spec you are formally verifying the program meets). You are then subject to the bugs present in *that* program (the spec) and the bugs present in the compiler (the formal verifier). But people are forced to spend more time with the code, which generally helps them (in particular smart people) to eradicate bugs. Another way to achieve the same thing is to freeze the code base and let it mature over decades, but I don't see the business model for that. Also, writing it twice with different languages, especially at different levels of abstraction, makes it less likely that the same bugs will appear in both. You can choose the higher level language so that it has great expressive power exactly for the things that are a pain to capture and verify (and thus a source of bugs) in the lower-level language. Last time I checked, formal methods were even able to catch design errors in some networking protocols. But you're right, they are not absolutely perfect because the tools and operators aren't, etc... That doesn't mean they can't help a great deal. I have great hopes for their usefulness. Maybe some day they will help so much that the distinction between what they can produce and absolutely secure software will become too small to matter. Whether we'll still be alive when that happens is another question. Pascal ___ Secure Coding mailing list (SC-L) SC-L@securecoding.org List information, subscriptions, etc - http://krvw.com/mailman/listinfo/sc-l List charter available at - http://www.securecoding.org/list/charter.php This electronic message transmission contains information that may be confidential or privileged. The information contained herein is intended solely for the recipient and use by any other party is not authorized. If you are not the intended recipient (or otherwise authorized to receive this message by the intended recipient), any disclosure, copying, distribution or use of the contents of the information is prohibited. If you have received this electronic message transmission in error, please contact the sender by reply email and delete all copies of this message. Cigital, Inc. accepts no responsibility for any loss or damage resulting directly or indirectly from the use of this email or its contents. Thank You. ___ Secure Coding mailing list (SC-L) SC-L@securecoding.org List information, subscriptions, etc - http://krvw.com/mailman/listinfo/sc-l List charter available at - http://www.securecoding.org/list/charter.php ___ Secure Coding mailing list (SC-L) SC-L@securecoding.org List information, subscriptions, etc - http://krvw.com/mailman/listinfo/sc-l List charter available at - http://www.securecoding.org/list/charter.php
Re: [SC-L] bumper sticker slogan for secure software
On 7/20/06 3:46 PM, Florian Weimer [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: * Pascal Meunier: But it's true for stupid bugs like buffer overflows and format string vulnerabilities, in which we're still swimming, and the proof is the fact that those aren't possible in some languages. Could you name a few such language implementations? 8-) In most cases, the components that enforces the absence of buffer overflows are written in C. snip That's irrelevant. What is important is that some magic formal tool could say that some code in language A, where bug of type k is possible, is not equivalent to the version in language B, where type k bugs are impossible, ergo you have found a type k bug (in the absence of any other bug in that section of code...). I know someone is going to ask, why didn't you code it only in language B then?, to which there can be many different answers, and I don't want to get into that. For design/requirements bugs, I'm reading: Safety-critical software is a very different beast. You can make much stronger assumptions about the environment. It's not clear if the results apply to software security in open system. I'm not saying that formal methods have no value. But I doubt that comparisons with projects at completely different dollars-per-line-of-code levels give immediate insights. That's one of the things I'm hoping for: that more and better formal methods become more affordable and practical. Spark, for example, demonstrated that the costs of some formal methods were much lower than what people expected, in real projects. That gives me hope. Pascal ___ Secure Coding mailing list (SC-L) SC-L@securecoding.org List information, subscriptions, etc - http://krvw.com/mailman/listinfo/sc-l List charter available at - http://www.securecoding.org/list/charter.php
Re: [SC-L] bumper sticker slogan for secure software
On 7/20/06 3:11 PM, Florian Weimer [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: * Pascal Meunier: Also, writing it twice with different languages, especially at different levels of abstraction, makes it less likely that the same bugs will appear in both. Algorithmic issues such as denial of service attacks through unbalanced binary trees or hash table collisions are pretty independent of the programming language and have been observed in many incarnations. If you implement the same protocol, it's likely that you end up with similar bugs. The DNS compression loop bug was reinvented many times. The fundamental mismatch in OpenPGP between key certification (key plus user ID) and key usage (just the key alone) affected many independently developed implementations. Chrome spoofing is ubiquitous in web browsers. Most things in this list are implemented in C or C++, but the problems are at such a high level that it's unlikely that a different choice of wildly different programming language would make a huge difference. If you look at lower-level bugs, such as buffer overflows, I hope that nobody still thinks that multiple code versions help -- just look at the long list (even after discounting direct code copies) of botched ASN.1 decoders. Some protocols are extremly hard to implement correctly, I'm afraid. (And not all protocols are unnecessarily complex.) It's obvious that if you just translate a bad, complicated algorithm or protocol from one language to the next, they'll all be bad. It remains that sometimes when you make people say something stupid twice they catch on the second time, especially during code reviews, because they re-express the code using natural language. That's why I said, less likely. It works with some and not others. Pascal ___ Secure Coding mailing list (SC-L) SC-L@securecoding.org List information, subscriptions, etc - http://krvw.com/mailman/listinfo/sc-l List charter available at - http://www.securecoding.org/list/charter.php
Re: [SC-L] bumper sticker slogan for secure software
At 9:46 PM +0200 7/20/06, Florian Weimer wrote: * Pascal Meunier: But it's true for stupid bugs like buffer overflows and format string vulnerabilities, in which we're still swimming, and the proof is the fact that those aren't possible in some languages. Could you name a few such language implementations? 8-) Ada ! In most cases, the components that enforces the absence of buffer overflows are written in C. Not in VAX/DEC/Compaq/HP Ada, which is the one that I use. But the components that enforce the absence of buffer overflows are not written in Bliss (the language of the Ada RTL for that compiler) either. They are in the code that is generated, or the failure to generate that code because the problem was caught at compile time. -- Larry Kilgallen ___ Secure Coding mailing list (SC-L) SC-L@securecoding.org List information, subscriptions, etc - http://krvw.com/mailman/listinfo/sc-l List charter available at - http://www.securecoding.org/list/charter.php
Re: [SC-L] bumper sticker slogan for secure software
Actually, it is a myth. For every non-trivial system, there are business pressures on resourcing, deadlines, and acceptable quality (pick any two). Once a business has set their taste for risk, it makes no sense to spend say $10m on security controls on a product and delay it for six months which may only bring in $2m in revenue in total, or none at all if the company runs out of money to bring it to market. At the moment, most companies neither accept or assign the risk, enumerate the risk correctly, nor take adequate steps to eliminate as much risk as possible. We need to improve all three aspects. Even in a perfect world, there will still be bugs and security defects. Let's make sure that the remaining ones are really hard to exploit, and when the exploit happens, not much loss occurs. thanks, Andrew On 19/07/2006, at 10:59 AM, mikeiscool wrote: Absolute security is a myth. no it isn't. pretending it is a 'myth' is an attempt by sloppy programmers and designers to explain away the reasons for their applications failing. smime.p7s Description: S/MIME cryptographic signature ___ Secure Coding mailing list (SC-L) SC-L@securecoding.org List information, subscriptions, etc - http://krvw.com/mailman/listinfo/sc-l List charter available at - http://www.securecoding.org/list/charter.php
Re: [SC-L] bumper sticker slogan for secure software
Absolute security is a myth. As is designing absolutely secure software. I have high hopes in formal methods. All formal methods do is push bugs around. Basically, you end up writing in a higher-level language (the spec you are formally verifying the program meets). You are then subject to the bugs present in *that* program (the spec) and the bugs present in the compiler (the formal verifier). Formal methods are a useful tool, and have a place. But they are not a magic bullet. /~\ The ASCII der Mouse \ / Ribbon Campaign X Against HTML [EMAIL PROTECTED] / \ Email! 7D C8 61 52 5D E7 2D 39 4E F1 31 3E E8 B3 27 4B ___ Secure Coding mailing list (SC-L) SC-L@securecoding.org List information, subscriptions, etc - http://krvw.com/mailman/listinfo/sc-l List charter available at - http://www.securecoding.org/list/charter.php
[SC-L] bumper sticker slogan for secure software
Paolo Perego [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] writes: Software is like Titanic, pleople claim it was unsinkable. Securing is providing it power steering But power steering wouldn't have saved it. By the time the iceberg was spotted, there was not enough time to turn that large a boat. Perhaps radar, but that doesn't make a very good analogy. Maybe a thicker tougher hull and automatic compartment doors? -Dave ___ Secure Coding mailing list (SC-L) SC-L@securecoding.org List information, subscriptions, etc - http://krvw.com/mailman/listinfo/sc-l List charter available at - http://www.securecoding.org/list/charter.php
Re: [SC-L] bumper sticker slogan for secure software
Or perhaps less arrogance in believing it won't sink. Absolute security is a myth. As is designing absolutely secure software. It is a lofty goal, but one of an absolute that just isn't achievable as threats change and new attack patterns are found. Designing secure software is about attaining a level of balance around software dependability weighed against mitigated risks against said software to acceptable tolerance levels, while at the same time ensuring said software accomplishes the original goal... to solve some problem for the user. On my office door is a bumper sticker I made. It simply says: 0x5 10 points to the first person to explain what that means. Regards, Dana Epp [Microsoft Security MVP] http://silverstr.ufies.org/blog/ -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of SC-L Subscriber Dave Aronson Sent: Tuesday, July 18, 2006 7:53 AM To: SC-L@securecoding.org Subject: [SC-L] bumper sticker slogan for secure software Paolo Perego [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] writes: Software is like Titanic, pleople claim it was unsinkable. Securing is providing it power steering But power steering wouldn't have saved it. By the time the iceberg was spotted, there was not enough time to turn that large a boat. Perhaps radar, but that doesn't make a very good analogy. Maybe a thicker tougher hull and automatic compartment doors? -Dave ___ Secure Coding mailing list (SC-L) SC-L@securecoding.org List information, subscriptions, etc - http://krvw.com/mailman/listinfo/sc-l List charter available at - http://www.securecoding.org/list/charter.php ___ Secure Coding mailing list (SC-L) SC-L@securecoding.org List information, subscriptions, etc - http://krvw.com/mailman/listinfo/sc-l List charter available at - http://www.securecoding.org/list/charter.php
Re: [SC-L] bumper sticker slogan for secure software
Best for older cars... My other car is a bit more secure Best for Volvos (or pick another high safety brand): I wish my finance systems are as safe as this car Honk if you want secure software Who has your data? Ask for secure software next time thanks, Andrew smime.p7s Description: S/MIME cryptographic signature ___ Secure Coding mailing list (SC-L) SC-L@securecoding.org List information, subscriptions, etc - http://krvw.com/mailman/listinfo/sc-l List charter available at - http://www.securecoding.org/list/charter.php
Re: [SC-L] bumper sticker slogan for secure software
well... there's no possible definition... unless programmers start thinking and acting in another way, and who commissions the software respect and pays for the real value of it, and users understand the value, Secure Software is an Oxymoron (there may be a reason why this has moron inside..) ___ Secure Coding mailing list (SC-L) SC-L@securecoding.org List information, subscriptions, etc - http://krvw.com/mailman/listinfo/sc-l List charter available at - http://www.securecoding.org/list/charter.php
[SC-L] bumper sticker slogan for secure software
mikeiscool [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] writes: The point remains though: trimming this down into a friendly little phrase is, IMCO, useless. One of the common problems in trying to persuade the masses of ANYTHING, be it the importance of secure software, the factual or moral correctness of your political stances, etc., is how to communicate it so that they will understand and receive the message. You can easily confuse them, bore them, or turn them against yourself. Truly putting it on bumper stickers is likely to be useless, but this is a useful exercise in thinking how we could express the concept briefly and simply. Another useful thing would be if all engineers would enroll in Toastmasters, but that's another story. ;-) -Dave, Governor of Toastmasters Area 63 (District 27) ___ Secure Coding mailing list (SC-L) SC-L@securecoding.org List information, subscriptions, etc - http://krvw.com/mailman/listinfo/sc-l List charter available at - http://www.securecoding.org/list/charter.php
