Book Image

Adversarial Tradecraft in Cybersecurity

By : Dan Borges
Book Image

Adversarial Tradecraft in Cybersecurity

By: Dan Borges

Overview of this book

Little has been written about what to do when live hackers are on your system and running amok. Even experienced hackers tend to choke up when they realize the network defender has caught them and is zoning in on their implants in real time. This book will provide tips and tricks all along the kill chain of an attack, showing where hackers can have the upper hand in a live conflict and how defenders can outsmart them in this adversarial game of computer cat and mouse. This book contains two subsections in each chapter, specifically focusing on the offensive and defensive teams. It begins by introducing you to adversarial operations and principles of computer conflict where you will explore the core principles of deception, humanity, economy, and more about human-on-human conflicts. Additionally, you will understand everything from planning to setting up infrastructure and tooling that both sides should have in place. Throughout this book, you will learn how to gain an advantage over opponents by disappearing from what they can detect. You will further understand how to blend in, uncover other actors’ motivations and means, and learn to tamper with them to hinder their ability to detect your presence. Finally, you will learn how to gain an advantage through advanced research and thoughtfully concluding an operation. By the end of this book, you will have achieved a solid understanding of cyberattacks from both an attacker’s and a defender’s perspective.
Table of Contents (11 chapters)

Adversarial theory

Computer security can be such a complex topic that it is often difficult to discuss in terms of dominant high-level theory. Every few years, new strategies emerge in both offense and defense, and after three decades, there is no clear winner of the dominant strategy in the space. The industry is still nascent in terms of a dominant cyber strategy, yet some strategies routinely outperform others in this evolutionary landscape. In this book, I will take a similar approach to game theory in that I will analyze some of the best possible strategies each side can use. I will break down why each strategy is optimal for a given situation, along with some strategies that can counter these techniques when used by the opposition. Examples of the strategies shifting over time can be seen on the defensive side in every new cycle of startups. For example, a very clear shift can be seen in vendor dominance moving from traditional antivirus solutions focused on specific malware...