Journal of Network and Information Security

Dennis Guster ¹, Abdul Raqeeb ¹, Erich Rice ¹

Affiliations
1 Saint Cloud State University, US

Abstract

With the advances in cloud computing and the use of virtualisation, the complexity of computing systems had never been greater. Due to this greater complexity securing these systems have also become more complex and difficult, especially given the ease with which hackers can bring to bear Denial of Service (DoS) attacks. Luckily, advances in technology have also provided the means of administering these complex computing systems through the use of mobile devices, such as with an Android OS based smartphone. In this paper we provide an option for managing the eradication of rogue processes created through DoS attacks by way of a mobile device application or app. Through the use of this mobile app built on the Android platform a system administrator would be alerted to a potential security incident and be given the tools to kill a rogue process without having to be onsite or initiate a terminal session through secure shell or another terminal program. This type of option could be very appealing to small or mid-sized enterprises which cannot afford the cost of having personnel staffed onsite 24 hours a day, seven days a week. The mobile app was built with security in mind and would provide a system administrator a quicker and more direct ability to curtail DoS attacks before they caused greater harm.

Keywords

Denial of Service (DoS), Mobile APPS, Android, Rogue Processes.

Full Text

     

Erich Rice ¹, Dennis Guster ¹, Laura Lebentritt ¹

Affiliations
1 Saint Cloud State University, US

Abstract

The advent of cloud computing has decreased the cost of enterprise level system design and implementation, while at the same time increasing the need for a sound and secure strategy for security. While the use of encryption algorithms continues to be the main line of defense in performing secure data transmissions, the use of a Cloud Computing environment offers both advantages and disadvantages in the encryption process. Though the new series of encryption algorithms are quite robust, they require a "key" to make their use unique for an individual session, thus if the key is compromised then the underlying encryption algorithm can be broken. In a classically designed system, the entire cryptographic key is contained on one node within the network, if this node is compromised even though robustly protected, then the entire network would be at risk.

The flip side to the potential breaking in dilemma outlined above is perhaps an even scarier option, one in which the node on which the key is kept is corrupted either through malicious intent, unintended mishap, or simple system failure. This scenario opens up the possibility that the key is unrecoverable, in which case the data that has been encrypted with the cryptographic key may be rendered unrecoverable as well.

This paper analyzed how a distributed key system, broken up over varying numbers of multiple nodal instances, and distributed across the Amazon Web Services (AWS) Cloud reacted and performed their intended task of authenticating a web service. Different numbers of nodes were evaluated and timing was recorded to assure that latency did not exceed the specified level of three seconds, where e-commerce or other Web based activities would be negatively impacted. As additional numbers of nodes were added to the system the latency increased. Also, as nodes were taken offline the latency also increased, as there were fewer options of key nodes that could reply to the system to replicate the key. And finally, when more than the required nodes were taken offline the system failed to authenticate the Client.

Keywords

Distributed Systems, Cloud Computing, Key Management, Fault Tolerance.

Full Text