A Survey Of IPv6 Address Usage In The Public Domain Name System

The IPv6 protocol has been slowly increasing in use on the Internet. The main reason for the development of the protocol is that the address space provided by IPv4 is nearing exhaustion. The pool of addresses provided by IPv6 is 296 times larger than IPv4, and should be sufficient to provide an address for every device for the foreseeable future. Another potential advantage of this significantly large address space is the use of randomly assigned addresses as a security barrier as part of a defence in depth strategy. This research examined the addresses allocated by those implementing IPv6 to determine what method or pattern of allocation was being used by adopters of the protocol. This examination was done through the use of DNS queries of the AAAA IPv6 host record using public DNS servers. It was observed that 55.84% of IPv6 addresses were in the range of 0 to (232 − 1). For those addresses with unique interface identifier (IID) portions, a nearly equal number of sequential and random IIDs were observed. Hong Kong and Germany were found to have the greatest number of IPv6 addresses. These results suggest that adopters are allocating most addresses sequentially, meaning that no security advantage is being obtained. It is unclear as to whether this is through design or the following of accepted practice. Future research will continue to survey the IPv6 address space to determine whether the patterns observed here remain constant

The use of proline to determine salt tolerance in eucalyptus species and clones

There have been a number of studies that have examined the Eucalyptus spp. for their salt and waterlogging tolerance: but they have done so using conventional methods. A wide range of plants are known to produce greater amounts of proline when stressed, be it salt, temperature, \u27drought or several other types of stress. This study looked at production of proline in salt stressed eucalypts to determine whether it can be used to differentiate between individuals andspecies. A range of Eucalyptus species and salt tolerant clones of E. camaldulensis were grown to investigate their proline response to salt stress

Automated detection of vehicles with machine learning

Considering the significant volume of data generated by sensor systems and network hardware which is required to be analysed and interpreted by security analysts, the potential for human error is significant. This error can lead to consequent harm for some systems in the event of an adverse event not being detected. In this paper we compare two machine learning algorithms that can assist in supporting the security function effectively and present results that can be used to select the best algorithm for a specific domain. It is suggested that a naïve Bayesian classifier (NBC) and an artificial neural network (ANN) are most likely the best candidate algorithms for the proposed application. It was found that the NBC was faster and more accurate than the ANN for the given data set. Future research will look to repeat this process for cyber security specific applications, and also examine GPGPU optimisations to the machine learning algorithms.

Cybersecurity Vulnerabilities in Medical Devices: A Complex Environment and Multifaceted Problem

The increased connectivity to existing computer networks has exposed medical devices to cybersecurity vulnerabilities from which they were previously shielded. For the prevention of cybersecurity incidents, it is important to recognize the complexity of the operational environment as well as to catalog the technical vulnerabilities. Cybersecurity protection is not just a technical issue; it is a richer and more intricate problem to solve. A review of the factors that contribute to such a potentially insecure environment, together with the identification of the vulnerabilities, is important for understanding why these vulnerabilities persist and what the solution space should look like. This multifaceted problem must be viewed from a systemic perspective if adequate protection is to be put in place and patient safety concerns addressed. This requires technical controls, governance, resilience measures, consolidated reporting, context expertise, regulation, and standards. It is evident that a coordinated, proactive approach to address this complex challenge is essential. In the interim, patient safety is under threat

Patterns and patter - An investigation into SSH activity using Kippo Honeypots

This is an investigation of the activity detected on three honeypots that utilise the Kippo SSH honeypot system on VPS servers all on the same C class address. The systems ran on identical software bases and hardware configurations. The results are over the period 21st March 2013 until Tuesday 04 June 2013. The initial analysis covered in this paper examines behaviours and patterns detected of the attacking entities. The attack patterns were not consistent and there was large disparity in numbers and magnitude of attacks on all hosts. Some of these issues are explored in the paper

Why penetration testing is a limited use choice for sound cyber security practice

Penetration testing of networks is a process that is overused when demonstrating or evaluating the cyber security posture of an organisation. Most penetration testing is not aligned with the actual intent of the testing, but rather is driven by a management directive of wanting to be seen to be addressing the issue of cyber security. The use of penetration testing is commonly a reaction to an adverse audit outcome or as a result of being penetrated in the first place. Penetration testing used in this fashion delivers little or no value to the organisation being tested for a number of reasons. First, a test is only as good as the tools, the tester and the methodology being applied. Second, the results are largely temporal. That is, the test will likely only find known vulnerabilities that exist at one specific point in time and not larger longitudinal flaws with the cyber security of an organisation, one such flaw commonly being governance. Finally, in many cases, one has to question what the point is in breaking the already broken. Penetration testing has its place when used judiciously and as part of an overall review and audit of cyber security. It can be an invaluable tool to assess the ability of a system to survive a sustained attack if properly scoped and deployed. However, it is our assessment and judgement that this rarely occurs

Exchanging demands: Weaknesses in SSL implementations for mobile platforms

The ActiveSync protocol’s implementation on some embedded devices leaves clients vulnerable to unauthorised remote policy enforcement. This paper discusses a proof of concept attack against the implementation of ActiveSync in common Smart phones including Android devices and iOS devices. A two‐phase approach to exploiting the ActiveSync protocol is introduced. Phase 1 details the usage of a man‐in‐the‐middle attack to gain a vantage point over the client device, whilst Phase 2 involves spoofing the server‐side ActiveSync responses to initiate the unauthorised policy enforcement. These vulnerabilities are demonstrated by experiment, highlighting how the system can be exploited to perform a remote factory reset upon an Exchange‐integrated Smart phone

High Spatial Resolution Thermal-Infrared Spectroscopy with ALES: Resolved Spectra of the Benchmark Brown Dwarf Binary HD 130948BC

We present 2.9-4.1 micron integral field spectroscopy of the L4+L4 brown dwarf binary HD 130948BC, obtained with the Arizona Lenslets for Exoplanet Spectroscopy (ALES) mode of the Large Binocular Telescope Interferometer (LBTI). The HD 130948 system is a hierarchical triple system, in which the G2V primary is joined by two co-orbiting brown dwarfs. By combining the age of the system with the dynamical masses and luminosities of the substellar companions, we can test evolutionary models of cool brown dwarfs and extra-solar giant planets. Previous near-infrared studies suggest a disagreement between HD 130948BC luminosities and those derived from evolutionary models. We obtained spatially-resolved, low-resolution (R~20) L-band spectra of HD 130948B and C to extend the wavelength coverage into the thermal infrared. Jointly using JHK photometry and ALES L-band spectra for HD 130948BC, we derive atmospheric parameters that are consistent with parameters derived from evolutionary models. We leverage the consistency of these atmospheric quantities to favor a younger age (0.50 \pm 0.07 Gyr) of the system compared to the older age (0.79 \pm 0.22 Gyr) determined with gyrochronology in order to address the luminosity discrepancy.Comment: 17 pages, 9 figures, Accepted to Ap