A security analysis of email communications

The objective of this report is to analyse the security and privacy risks of email communications and identify technical countermeasures capable of mitigating them effectively. In order to do so, the report analyses from a technical point of view the core set of communication protocols and standards that support email communications in order to identify and understand the existing security and privacy vulnerabilities. On the basis of this analysis, the report identifies and analyses technical countermeasures, in the form of newer standards, protocols and tools, aimed at ensuring a better protection of the security and privacy of email communications. The practical implementation of each countermeasure is evaluated in order to understand its limitations and identify potential technical and organisational constrains that could limit its effectiveness in practice. The outcome of the above mentioned analysis is a set of recommendations regarding technical and organisational measures that when combined properly have the potential of more effectively mitigating the privacy and security risks of today's email communications.JRC.G.6-Digital Citizen Securit

DANE Trusted Email for Supply Chain Management

Supply chain management is critically dependent on trusted email mechanisms that address forgery, confidentiality, and sender authenticity. The IETF protocol ‘Domain Authentication of Named Entities’ (DANE) described in this paper has been extended from its initial goal of providing TLS web site validation to also offer a foundation for globally scalable and interoperable email security. Widespread deployment of DANE will require more than raw technology standards, however. Workflow automation mechanisms will need to emerge in order to simplify the publishing and retrieval of cryptographic credentials that are applicable for general audiences. Security policy enforcement will also need to be addressed. This paper gives a descriptive tutorial of trusted email technologies, shows how DANE solves key distribution logistics, and then suggests desirable automation components that could accelerate deployment of DANE-based trusted email. Pilot deployments are briefly described

E-mail encryption framework for Malaysian public sector

Securing confidential data shared through the electronic mail is depending on the current encryption method deployed by the E-mail service provider as well as the current procedures and regulation of the organization. Hence, the E-mail encryption framework is a fundamental factor in designing a secure E-mail service in the Malaysian Public Sector. Therefore, the purpose of this study is to develop the Email encryption framework for Malaysian Public Sector in order to secure the E-mail system. In this study, the qualitative study has been conducted in order to understand the criteria of the E-mail encryption framework for the Malaysian Public Sector. Thus, the descriptive design is conducted to discover the features E-mail encryption framework for Malaysian Public Sector from the E-mail administrator and related personnel. Therefore, in-depth interview with the semi-structured method of interview is used in this study. The E-mail encryption framework has been proposed which comprising of organizational, operational, technological, legal and ethical components. The proposed framework was evaluated to measure its effectiveness towards an existing e-mail system. Findings on the proposed e-mail encryption framework will benefit the Malaysian Public Sector in providing secure e-mail service thus deciding applicable security control. Finally, this study generally contributes to enhance the current secure e-mail system implementation in Malaysian public sector agencies

Security for the signaling plane of the SIP protocol

VOIP protocols are gaining greater acceptance amongst both users and service providers. This thesis will aim to examine aspects related to the security of signaling plane of the SIP protocol, one of the most widely used VOIP protocols. Firstly, I will analyze the critical issues related to SIP, then move on to discuss both current and possible future solutions, and finally an assessment of the impact on the performance of HTTP digest authentication, IPsec and TLS, the three main methods use

Trusted S/MIME Gateways

The utility of Web-based email clients is clear: a user is able to access their email account from any computer anywhere at any time. However, this option is unavailable to users whose security depends on their key pair being stored either on their local computer or in their browser. Our implementation seeks to solve two problems with secure email services. The first that of mobility: users must have access to their key pairs in order to perform the necessary cryptographic operations. The second is one of transition: initially, users would not want to give up their regular email clients. Keeping these two restrictions in mind, we decided on the implementation of a secure gateway system that works in conjunction with an existing mail server and client. Our result is PKIGate, an S/MIME gateway that uses the DigitalNet (formerly Getronics) S/MIME Freeware Library and IBM\u27s 4758 secure coprocessor. This thesis presents motivations for the project, a comparison with similar existing products, software and hardware selection, the design, use case scenarios, a discussion of implementation issues, and suggestions for future work

Comparison of different ways to avoid internet traffic interception

Projecte fet en col.laboració amb la Norwegian University of Science and Technology. Department of Telematic EngineeringEnglish: The main objective of this thesis is to analyze and compare different ways to avoid the Internet traffic eavesdropping (carried out both by governments or malicious particulars). The analysis consists on a description of the different protocols and technologies involved in each option as well as the difficulties to implement them and the technical knowledge of the users in order to take profit of them

Deploying a New Hash Algorithm

The strength of hash functions such as MD5 and SHA-1 has been called into question as a result of recent discoveries. Regardless of whether or not it is necessary to move away from those now, it is clear that it will be necessary to do so in the not-too-distant future. This poses a number of challenges, especially for certificate-based protocols. We analyze a number of protocols, including S/MIME and TLS. All require protocol or implementation changes. We explain the necessary changes, show how the conversion can be done, and list what measures should be taken immediately

Sigurnosni protokoli

The Internet, as a computer network, connects millions of people all around the world and gives them a possibility to access a big quantity of data. Throughout the Internet users exchange data using certain protocols and a part of this communication is private or secret. TCP (Transmission Control Protocol) and IP (Internet Protocol) protocols are the kernel of Internet protocol. Everything that is transmitted through the Internet uses these protocols, but they cannot provide security of data transfer. For example, IP packages can be easily changed and their content can be seen by everybody in every moment, even by an unauthorized person. Today the world is already globally connected and the individuals and institutions need privacy and also the protection from identity theft that is today a very frequent aspect of misuse of the Internet. So, we need transparent and flexible tools to fulfill demands of different users and at the same time capable to achieve the assigned degree of security. Security protocols, as the most prominent SSL (Secure Sockets Layers) and TLS (Transport Layer Security), solve a good part of given problems.Internet, kao računarska mreža, povezuje milione ljudi širom sveta i obezbeđuje im pristup velikoj količini informacija. Korisnici preko Interneta razmenjuju podatke na osnovu određenih protokola, a deo te komunikacije je privatnog ili službeno tajnog karaktera. Pri ovoj razmeni, korisnici resursa računarskih sistema, računara u mrežama i samostalnih računara, pre svega žele da budu sigurni da će pristup njihovim podacima i resursima uopšte imati samo oni kojima se pristup dozvoli. Dakle, analogno sigurnosti fizičke imovine korisnici računarskih sistema žele takozvanu računarsku sigurnost. Jezgro Internet protokola predstavljaju TCP (Transmission Control Protocol) i IP (Internet Protocoll) protokoli. Sve što putuje Internetom koristi ove protokole, ali oni ne obezbeđuje sigurnost prenosa podataka. IP paketi se, na primer, mogu lako izmeniti a njihov sadržaj može u bilo kom trenutku da pregleda ma ko, pa i neovlašćena osoba. U svetu koji je danas već globalno povezan, pojedinci i razne institucije imaju potrebe za privatnošću, kao i za zaštitom od krađe identiteta, koja postaje sve češći vid zloupotrebe globalne mreže. Dakle, potrebna su sredstva koja su transparentna i dovoljno fleksibilna da zadovolje zahteve raznih korisnika, a istovremeno ostvare zadati stepen sigurnosti. U ovom radu, pažnja je usmerena na komunikacijske zaštitne mehanizme definisane sigurnosnim protokolima, pri čemu se smatra da su ispunjene ostale kategorije računarske sigurnosti. Protokoli TLS (Transport Layer Security) i SSL (Secure Sockets Layers) su kriptografski protokoli koji omogućavaju sigurnu komunikaciju na Internetu za poslove elektronskog bankarstva i trgovine, e-mail, fax, pristup udaljenim računarima, a korisnicima rešavaju dobar deo navedenih problema

Towards the definition of a quality model for mail servers

The paper presents an approach for building a Mail Server Quality Model, based on the ISO/IEC software quality standard. We start by defining the mail system domain to be used as general framework and the relevant technologies involved. Then a general overview of the ISO/IEC standard is given. The basic steps, the relevant considerations and criteria used to select the appropriated subcharacteristics and quality attributes are also presented. The selected attributes are categorized under the six ISO/IEC quality characteristics conforming the model. Finally some case studies requirements and two commercial mail server tools are used to evaluate the model.Postprint (published version