In this episode

• Will gives us a lay of the land on the state of "state sponsored" and advanced threats
• We discuss collective advances in malware
• We discuss the persistence of 'old' malware, and code re-use
• We discuss enterprise defense and strategy
• Will gives us some wisdom from his experiencein helping clients defend themselves

Guest

• Will Gragido ( @wgragido ) - Will is currently a senior manager in the Threat Research Intelligence organization at RSA NetWitness. Will is an information security and risk management professional with over 18 year’s professional industry experience, Mr.Gragido brings a wealth of knowledge and experience to bear. Working in a variety of roles, Mr.Gragido has deep expertise and knowledge in operations, analysis, management, professional services & consultancy, pre-sales / architecture and business development within the information security industry. You cn get more information on Will on his LinkedIn page.

Hello! This is a special episode in that it's our year-end wrap-up. We bring together 3 of the industry's best to talk about the year that was, the things that made were on your mind, and maybe give us a hint at what is to come...

Guests

• Will Gragido ( @wgragido ) - Will is the Sr. Manager of threat Research Intelligence for RSA NetWitness and a lightweight with the cold medicine.
• John Pirc ( @jopirc ) - John is the Vice President of Research at NSS Labs, with very strong hair.
• David Marcus ( @DaveMarcus ) - David is the Director and Chief Architect of the Federal Advanced Program Group at McAfee and a kettle bell monster!

Notably absent, but invited, were Dave Lewis ("fell asleep") and Dave Kennedy ("was on an airplane") ...apparently because I thought it would be fun to invite every Dave I know....... but seriously next time guys :)

James and I would like to wish all our listeners a very merry holiday season, and a happy, healthy and prosperous 2014.

Folks, if you work with, design, or implement embedded systems this is one episode you don't want to miss. Fair warning, it's a little bit long at just over 50 minutes total. I hope you find the extra time worth the effort of listening, I know we sure did!

In this episode

• The quirky things that Josh's organization gets to work on and deconstruct
• The methodology of breaking foreign things
• Android and why it's "horribly interesting" beyond just the OS everyone sees
• Hacking Android at the very, very, very basic hardware interface(s)
• Copy/Paste software development and it's pitfalls
• Embedded devices as pivot points for intrusion
• The importance of embedded systems, and why no one is writing secure code (still)

Guest

• Josh Thomas ( @m0nk_dot ) - Chief Breaking Officer for Atredis, Security researcher, mobile phone geek, mesh networking evangelist and general breaker of things electronic. Typical projects of interest span the hardware / software barrier and rarely have a UI. m0nk has spent the last year or two digging deep into Android and iOS internals, with a major focus on both the network stack implementation and the driver and below hardware interfaces. He uses IDA more frequently than Eclipse (and a soldering iron more that both). His life dreams are to ride a robot unicorn on a moonlit beach and make the world a better place, but mostly the unicorn thing...

Special thanks to Steve Ragan ( @SteveD3 ) for sitting in this morning and providing his perspective as a journalist.

Topics Covered

• "Leaked" FBI memo to government agencies says "there's a hacking spree on government websites, and it's Anonymous!" (we have to chuckle, a little) - http://www.theregister.co.uk/2013/11/18/anon_us_gov_hack_warning/ , http://www.thewire.com/national/2013/11/fbi-anonymous-hackers-stole-over-100000-employees-information/71675/
• Fokirtor is a very interesting new piece of malware that targetted Linux systems, but by slipping into SSH comms - http://www.theregister.co.uk/2013/11/15/stealthy_linux_backdoor/ ( and a related piece of malware - http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/linux-worm-targeting-hidden-devices )
• The Healthcare.gov website is a case study in how not to release a web app, or complex system; and it's not even a partisan issue anymore - http://arstechnica.com/security/2013/11/healthcare-gov-targeted-by-more-than-a-dozen-hacking-attempts/
• Ahead of the G20 meeting to be held there in 2014, the city of Brisbane, Australia performs a penetration test on their physical city infrastructure, finds major flaws. A plot from "The Italian Job"? - http://www.qao.qld.gov.au/files/file/Reports%20and%20publications/Reports%20to%20Parliament%202013-14/RTP5Trafficmanagementsystems.pdf
• [Scary] Renesys says someone is hijacking the Internet ... but is it on purpose, or just mistakes? (Does it matter?) - http://www.nbcnews.com/technology/wheres-your-data-going-hacks-redirect-traffic-through-distant-lands-2D11624570
• A new piece of software quietly turns you into a bitcoin mine for the developer (and you agree to it in the EULA!) - http://www.networkworld.com/news/2013/120213-sneaky-software-turns-your-pc-276490.html?source=nww_rss