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Kaspersky OS

eugene.kaspersky.com

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Re: Kaspersky OS

#231

Post by CaptSpify »

kbenson wrote: post #223
CaptSpify wrote: post #173

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, I'll concede the specifics, but the impact is the same. They show that Google, FB, etc are all sending their data to the NSA and others. > That's the problem with intellectual americans - you guys know how bad things are in your country, but not realize how worse they are everywhere else. What? Just because some situations are worse in other countries means the US can't be doing anything wrong?

> No, I'll concede the specifics, but the impact is the same. They show that Google, FB, etc are all sending their data to the NSA and others. Are you talking about National Security Letters? That's a complex topic. I would hope the companies did what they could to fight where they had room, but I also don't necessarily expect companies to break the law. If you're talking about data, the NSA tapped private datacenter…

> Are you talking about National Security Letters? That's a complex topic.

Indeed it is complex, but the end result is still the same. Sure, they don't have to fight the law, but I also don't have to trust them with my data. Nor does Russia, and I'd even argue that it's stupid for Russia to do so.

Re: Kaspersky OS

#232

Post by MichaelBurge »

nickpsecurity wrote: post #226
MichaelBurge wrote: post #224

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Can't you sue a company selling security products if it ends up being insecure? This is different from ordinary software, because most ordinary software isn't marketed with security as its primary selling feature. And if they're not getting it tested by independent experts, that could be negligence. If they're not liable in any way, then I agree it's nothing more than marketing to call it secure.

There's little to no liability in most situations. Security experts have been pushing for liability for a long time as a solution to this. Basically, we want a minimum level of responsibility like what exists in safety-critical industries. Schneier has a brief essay that explains it well: https://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2004/11/computer_secu...

I suppose the other economic option is insurance. That works best in general with a lawsuit, but certain companies that would suffer great damages with a breach should be motivated to buy insurance.

One example would be companies handling credit card information. If you leak a bunch of credit cards, Visa has to invalidate and reissue the cards, and the issuing banks have to spend a lot of money handling customer support. So they're motivated to punish companies when there are security breaches, and to write these punishments into the contracts.

Thanks for the article.

Re: Kaspersky OS

#233

Post by bonzini »

mmalone wrote: post #163
sjellis wrote: post #21

My suspicion is that most attempts to create a better OS for IoT will fail for political reasons. AFIAKT, one really important characteristic of Linux (and JavaScript also) for large tech companies is that they can control their own stacks, without having to license tech from another corporation, but still have the benefit of network effects. Samsung have Tizen, Google have ChromeOS etc. etc. At the component level,…

Linux doesn't scale down very well though. I really don't need the full Linux API for a lightbulb. Most embedded OSs are microkernels for this reason. If any mega-trend has a chance of unseating Linux and generally disrupting the OS space it's IoT.

A lightbulb will have an RTOS, not a microkernel. While microkernels provide utmost isolation between processes and well-defined primitives for communications, a lightbulb might not even have separate supervisor and user modes.

Re: Kaspersky OS

#234

Post by nickpsecurity »

kbenson wrote: post #209
mmalone wrote: post #160

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The article is light on details, but based on the way they talked about it ("impossible to hack in principle") it's likely that they actually can _prove_ that it's more secure than a Linux distro dedicated to security insofar as they're able to prove anything at all. Since the Linux APIs are not formally specified, or verified, it's essentially impossible to _prove_ anything at all (again, in a formal sense). Formal…

> Since the Linux APIs are not formally specified, or verified That said, they are apparently stable enough to emulate enough of Linux that from another OS that you can simulate a Linux OS as a container and run software as if it's on Linux.[1] So, to my mind that implies that while they may not be formally specified, it's not too hard to look at what's actually implemented and treat that as a sort of loose spec. 1:…

A formal spec would be great but you're right. Plenty of people have done working layers of Linux in user-mode, etc. The only thing I know with formal specifications was filesystem API's for testing them. There have also been selective ones for things like robust drivers. Personally, I'd love to see one just to document all the state and covert channels. Especially visually. I bet it would be one, big-ass, messy graph. :)

Re: Kaspersky OS

#235

Post by nickpsecurity »

Dolores12 wrote: post #115
EugeneOZ wrote: post #88

Only use it if you want to send all of your information to FSB (modern KGB). Evgeniy Kasperskiy has friends in government, police and FSB. He also is apologet of state surveillance.

I prefer the FSB to have access to my files than NSA. What FSB can do to me? Send to Guantanamo?

This is a valid point. I told people elsewhere best way to deal with subversion [aside from avoiding computers] is to assess one's threat model against various countries, identify which secrets need to be protected from which if at all, and then protect them using stuff from most opposing country. The one you trust might compromise you but the one that's truly a threat won't.

Outside of national politics, Russia is most likely to steal the I.P. of say an American user outside of it. Whereas American intelligence and police organizations might lock up that same user for some bullshit. Situation is reversed for a Russian considering U.S. solutions. Some countries or organizations are unlikely to steal your I.P. or attack you. They become better choice than the aggressive ones. Then there's multinational, FOSS projects with strong security focus at the high-end. Gotta build them from carefully-acquired source, though. ;)

Re: Kaspersky OS

#236

Post by diegoperini »

linkregister wrote: post #155
rthomas6 wrote: post #134

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But OSX, Windows, and full-blown Linux aren't used as embedded OSes either. Linux is a bit, but there are a lot of other choices.

I'm not sure if it shares APIs with Win32, but Windows CE runs almost half of every ATM I've ever used.

Also cash machines.

Re: Kaspersky OS

#237

Post by nickpsecurity »

this-dang-guy wrote: post #144
adrianN wrote: post #140

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you can't trust your processor you can't trust any of your verification chain that runs on said processor.

Ahem http://rationalviews.com/t/presentation-on-fully-open-source... You could go into that rabbit hole. I'd recommend against it... I lost days reading all the docs and playing with this

Ahem what? That proves nothing. Here's a write-up I did on verifying hardware against subversion.

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10468624

It's a hard problem. That's why DARPA is throwing tons of money and brains at it right now. Also why a number of defense contractors maintain their own fabs and packaging plants despite the technology aging.

Re: Kaspersky OS

#238

Post by Vendan »

Aldo_MX wrote: post #211
Vendan wrote: post #161

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well, there's also how serious the vulnerabilities are. Linux kernel had 4 code execution vulns, Windows 10 had 44. Linux had 44 gain privilege vulns, Windows 10 had 79. Linux seemed to have mostly DoS vulns, which is admittedly not great, but I'd rather a server go down then get compromised and used to take over the rest of the network. Then there's the fun stuff, like mimikatz, that's been around since windows XP a…

It is expected that the smallest attack surface will have less critical vulnerabilities, comparing an entire distro gives you a different picture, since categories like code execution get similar results. The stark contrast is in the privilege escalation vulnerabilities from the Windows side vs the other categories on the Linux side. I would assume that many persons prefer a server to go down, corrupt its data and le…

Yeah, but now you swung in the opposite direction. Look at Debian Linux's 2016 code exec vulns and you'll see it's got a like Firefox and Chrome and Drupal and Mercurial... not exactly OS components... whereas the windows 10 vulns are are windows OS components. I'd personally be curious if any of those "debian vulns" would be equally applicable to the same software installed on windows.

Re: Kaspersky OS

#239

Post by nickpsecurity »

this-dang-guy wrote: post #175
valarauca1 wrote: post #154

Earlier quoted context omitted.

POWER8/9 isn't fully open. Read the license agreements. While you get access to a lot of stuff, there is a lot of fine print you are ignoring. A lot of the deep docs are behind paywalls. To get access to POWER8/9 literature you sign away your rights to OPEN-POWER. Also if you make anything for POWER8/9, under a public license (what license you can/can't use are dictated by the license agreement), using docs obtained…

Yeah, I went down that rabbit hole a bit. The point is - it's about the only way to do a real actual code audit on what your processor is doing.

You can pay a company to fab a Leon3 or Leon4 for you. Leon3 is GPL with eASIC already supporting it in their Nextreme's. There's also Rocket RISC-V core that was fabbed on a 45nm SOI process. Do it on the same node with anything extra an external, swappable component on the PCB for supplier diversity. Additionally, Cambridge has FreeBSD running on a capability-secure version of 64-bit MIPS on FPGA's. It's called CHERI CPU and CHERIBSD. One might put that processor on an ASIC.

There's been many options but basically little individual, non-profit, or corporate work to make them happen. (shrugs)

Re: Kaspersky OS

#240

Post by nickpsecurity »

hackuser wrote: post #186
valarauca1 wrote: post #107

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah you only FTrace your entire networking stack at watch if it ever sends/receives packets without your knowledge. Or use libpcap and accomplish the same task. Or use a user space packet stack stack and disable your default network interface. I get not everything on the system is pure FOSS. But every binary ball isn't NSA spyware. If you assume that is true, you literally cannot use ANY computer. FOSS OS's make it…

> But every binary ball isn't NSA spyware. If you assume that is true, you literally cannot use ANY computer. You can use one, but you can expect it's exploited. It might not be a happy fact, but we shouldn't deny it if it's true. The NSA by itself has 40,000 employees, tens of billions in budget, the best tools and tech in the world, and a track record of doing such things. I expect that if they see a valuable vulne…

Most of them aren't exploiting software. I like to instead give the dollar amount they put into backdooring, hacking, or tapping major software or networks: $200+ million a year. Still a staggering amount that supports your point. If they doubt, just ask if they think whatever they're using is safe from all the black hats NSA could hire for just 1% of that amount? And for how long?

Answer isn't optimistic...

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