Symantec Connect Posts Round Up #3

I’ve really enjoyed writing these posts and hope you are finding something interesting from the various Symantec Connect posts that I’ve been linking to.  IF you are wondering why most of them (if not all) focusing on the Security Community within Symantec Connect it is because that is the focus of my job.

So here’s week #2 and week #1 and without further ado, here is week #3

• Update the DLP system from version 10.5 to version 11.5 – This one goes on the record for longest connect post that I’ve seen in a long time (I actually shortened it for this blog post).  But it covers the process for updating your DLP system as you move from version 10.5 to 11.6 along w/ updating the server that everything runs on.  Remember if you are using 10.5 Windows Server 2008 R2 was not supported for hosting the Enforce platform on it.  Now with the latest version (11.6.1) Server 2008 R2 is supported and recommended for running the DLP Product on.  Read along with how to set this up.
• Choice of Symantec product for business security — what programs – While this is not as long as the other post listed above it i interesting.  What we have hear is someone who uses Backup Exec and is looking to understand what security products Symantec has to help him/her out
  • This is something I help out my customers with each day.  Let’s sit down and have a conversation about how Symantec can help you out and advance your security posture.  What is the real question or goal of your organization as it becomes more mature in your security practice.  Drop me an email, would love to help you out.
• SCCM (Systems Center Configuration Manager) – In this post the customer is looking to understand the best way to deploy Symatnec Endpoint Protection (SEP) by leveraging System Center for the deployment solution. Take a look at this article for a more complete answer to the question.  I know that my company will have a video up shortly about deploying SEP w/ both Altiris and Systems Center.
• Implementing change management and configuration management for vontu – So this is going to be a full article/blog post and once I post it I’ll link it here as well.  Stay tuned but this is VERY IMPORTANT to handle and take care of
• How to install DLP Client – This person is looking for help on deploying the Endpoint Agent on various machines in his/her organization.  There are numerous links in the comment section that can help out.  Also my company will putting up a video on this shortly as well.
• Comparing Symantec cMobile Security 7.2 and Norton Mobile Security   – This one fascinates me and I haven’t spent any time reading or digging into the differences between the products.  This article is more of an FYI to myself so I can further figure out what the two products are
• DLP – Let the User Decide – This post is still looking for answer, so if you can help awesome…  The end user is looking to see if there is a way to allow the end user to decide if an email that is blocked should be released or not.  I’m not quite sure if this is the best way to setup DLP but if you can help out this questioner let me know and I’ll try to give you extra Connect points.
• GnuPg PGP Desktop Email – This is a question that I have long wondered about as well and the answer is MAYBE.  That is it depends on the version of GnuPGP and PGP Desktop.  Try it out it should work.

So that’s that… I hope you are finding these links interesting and maybe can help some people out still looking for support.

Drop me a note and let me know if you find them worthwhile or not.

Symantec Connect Post Round Up #2

Last week I posted a round up of various articles or posts that I’ve found interesting or exciting or something I wanted to save. One of the items that I posted here has since been solved so that’s pretty exciting.

This week was pretty light, not quite if it was due to me being busy or not finding a lot of information that made me excited.  One of the posts will warrant a further blog entry here.  So off to the round up…

• eWeek agrees with Symantec: Server Security is different than Laptop Security: I’m not sure why “Laptop Security” and “Server Security” is capitalized but whatever.  The important thing here is the article from eWeek that talks about reasons why securing a server is different than securing a laptop.  While it is pretty basic stuff, the article does bring up some good points.  Interested in securing your critical systems (not just servers)?  Look into Symantec Critical Systems Protection
• Search for a SSN inside DLP incidents:  The poster is looking if there is a specific way to search for a particular social security number within a bunch of incidents. As one poster mentions this might be possible with exporting the XML of all of incidents and then dumping it into a query.  Another person says you might be able to do it with IT Analytics.  ANyone have any great ideas for this person?
• Standard Operating Procedure — Where to Start?: So this is a fascinating question to me, something that I’ve helped many many customers with.  Where does one start with during an implementation of a DLP product?  This forum post has spawned another blog post and I will link it, once I got it up and going (maybe the football games tomorrow will be boring and I’ll have a chance to be productive?).
• How does DLP work with Images?: This is an interesting question and address within another forum entry.  Long story short I can fingerprint (IDM) a document or image to help track it down.  However Symantec DLP does not track specific images (flesh tones, colors, etc) but some products attempt to do tis.  Tracking down data stored in images is a complex tasks.

Well this was bit light on the round up, but some of the things I was looking at/reading on Symantec Connect.  Would like some feedback if you find this helpful or even interesting.

Jonathan

Symantec Connect Post Round up #1

I have been using Evernote for awhile but was recently introduced with the Chrome extension Evernote Clipper and this has changed how I browse the web and more importantly how I browse Symantec Connect.  So I started clipping various blog entries, articles and other information stored on the site to save for later.  In order to help share this information I will be creating a round up of various posts I’ve found interesting or important and post them to both my blog and also Symantec Connect.  Since I’m focusing on Symantec Security this year, these posts will be filed under the security portion of Connect.

So let’s get started on Round Up #1 (maybe 1 day I’ll come up with a better name or title)

• What’s new in Symantec PGP 10.3: This is a forum post looking for information on Symantec PGP and the new release.  The answer links to the release notes for Symantec Encryption Desktop 10.3.  Some cool new things in PGP 10.3 besides renaming it include support for Symantec File Share Encryption and Dropbox on Apple iOS device along with WinPE 64-bit support.  For more information read the release notes and also test things before upgrading.
• Is there a way to choose what response the DLP sends based upon the sender’s email address?:  The author of this post is looking to do some routing based on a sender’s email address.  I’m not quite sure what exactly is happening here, but found the question pretty interesting.  One of the limitations of Symatnec DLP is routing based on attributes or other items.  This is something my company is working on with more information to come.
• Does SCSP support reverse-proxy between agent and management server: This post is looking for a good answer so if you know Symatnec Critical Systems Protection and can give a good answer feel free to take a stab at this one.  The user is looking to see if a reverse proxy would work for communication between the agent and the management server.  If you have answer send me a note and I’ll mark it as answer.
• The Password Problem: A Call for Stronger Authentication: While this is not a Connect Post it does provide some very interesting information and a great starting part for conversations.  So its all about how passwords suck and must die.  This might lead to a further blog post so this is also a placeholder for more information.
• PGP Email support for iOS:  In the PGP 10.3 some new things are released, see the release notes linked above. The person is asking what he is missing when it comes to leveraging the Symantec PGP Viewer of iOS.  The answer is the customer must leverage universal server which is now renamed the Symantec Encryption Management Server.
• Symantec Positioned as a Leader in the Gartner Magic Quadrant for Endpoint Protection Platforms:  This is pretty exciting as Gartner has named Symantec and SEP 12.1 as a leader in the Magic Quadrant for Endpoint Protection Platforms.  Along with SEP, Symantec CSP is part of this report as well.  CSP employs a combination of HIDS and HIPS to help protect various environments.  Congrats to Symantec on this….
• A ton of IT Analytics posts have been coming out from David Prager from Bay Dynamics and here are some that are specific to Symantec Security products
  • Working with Cubes in the IT Analytics DLP Content Pack – A video that covers using the DLP report pack and a basic overview of IT Analytics as well
  • Working with Cubes in IT Analytics SEP Content Pack – Same as above but focused a bit around
  • Publishing IT Analytics Dashboards in Microsoft SharePoint – One of the cool things is that if you use IT Analytics you can publish the reports to SharePoint or another site.  This Connect Post covers how to do.

This is a starting point for my series on awesome Connect articles.  Hoping more will come

Catching up on DLP Links

There’s been a lot of discussion on the web these days in regards to DLP and also some of the moves Symantec made in regards to its purchase of PGP Corporation and also GuardianEdge:  Press Release here

Here are some more links that I’ve come across recently:

1. Cisco Security Services and also Cisco’s Risk Assessment Service:  Didn’t even know that Cisco offered a DLP Solution, but it is based around the IronPort product.  I don’t know anything in regards IronPort but will plan to learn more as we have one customer who is looking at it instead of Symantec DLP
2. Whitepaper released: Quick Wins with Data Loss Prevention:  This links to a whitepaper sponsored by McAfee and you can download the white paper from that link as well.  It is an interesting white paper and have added it to my collection
3. How to shape an effective DLP policy:  An Information Week article that talks about how an organziation should write DLP policies.  More on this later.
4. Breakout session from Symantec Vision:

Overview of DLP 10

Symantec has recently released an update to its DLP (Data Loss Prevention) product, version 10 and this article will provide a brief overview of some of the changes and differences.  More posts to follow will highlight other parts of DLP 10.

 

Console Changes
The first thing one will notice when connecting to a DLP 10 system is how the console has changed from previous versions.  The DLP 10 console has been simplified and streamlined to help it to be easier to navigate and make the system easier to be managed.  The new console looks like the following:

As highlighted in the next screenshot the menu system has been completely changed as well:

The menu is broken up into 4 areas, Home, Incidents, Policies, and System.  Home will open up what is set as your home page, in my system I have it setup for the Executive Summary for Endpoint.  Under Incidents we have the Incident Reports, then they are broken out by Network, Endpoint Protect and Discover, providing a simple way to find the incidents you are looking for.  Under Policies we find information related to the following:  Policy List, Response Rules, Endpoint User Groups, Discover Scanning, and Protected Content.  The Discover Scanning section is broken out further into Discover Targets and Discover Servers.  Under Protected Content you will also find Exact data and Indexed Documents.

Hopefully you will find it easier to navigate like I do.
Incident Changes

A lot of work  has been done in the Incident section of DLP 10.  The goal is to be able to understand the incident in under 5 seconds.  Is this a false positive?  Is this something I need to deal with right away?  What information can you tell me about this incident?  All questions that need to be dealt with as soon as possible and the changes made help you answer them quickly.

The example below shows a screenshot of a discover scan using sample data:

The incident is broken down into 3 sections or panes. The first pane provides the key info, history and correlations about the incident (see the following screenshot).

By seeing the Key Info right away I know what is going on with this incident at a quick glance and make a decision on whether or not i need to spend more time on it.  In DLP 9 this information was scattered a bit about but can bee seen quickly at a glance.

The second pane of an incident shows the match count behind this incident.  Based on the information I’ve read in the first pane, I will then spend time in the second taking a look at match count and also checking for false positives.

The third pane of an incident shows any custom attributes I am looking for or using.

Policy Changes

There have been some changes and additions to the default policies that ship with DLP however the way to write a policy has not been changed.  One of the policies has been modified to take a part some of the changes in the HITECH act.

As mentioned previously, under the menu Policies, you have the ability to configure the discover servers and scans and also edit the exact data and indexed documents. 

System Changes

There have been many changes to this part of the console as well.  The system section is broken up into the following areas:  Servers, Agents, System Reports, Settings, Incident Data, and User Management.

One really nice change is the addition of a credential manager, which is found under Credentials.  This allows me to save a credential and re-use it in different scans, etc.  This is found under System –> Settings –> Credentials and looks like the following:

 

Thanks for spending the time to read this overview of DLP.  In February I will be doing a webinar on DLP and if you are interested you can visit my company’s website (ITS Partners) here for more information and to sign up.

More employees steal data then ever survey says

The recession is creating camaraderie amongst workforces, at the expense of their employers, is the finding of a transatlantic survey. Carried out amongst 600 office workers in Canary Wharf London and Wall Street New York, 41% of workers have already taken sensitive data with them to their new position, whilst a third would pass on company information if it proved useful in getting friends or family a job.

From an article on a security website, it states more and more employees are stealing data when they leave their current employer.  A couple of interesting stats from the article:

• 85% of people admit they know it’s illegal to download corporate data.
• 57% of people say it is easier to take sensitive data this year, up 29% from last year
• Top of the list is customer and contact details

During this current recession people are doing whatever they can to have an edge, especially in a new job.  If I take my current customer list to me new job, then I will instantly have a leg up.

As an employer you need to protect your data, do you even know where your data is?  Using a tool like Symantec’s DLP you can find that information, track that information and prevent it from leaving your network. 

Welcome to Symantec DLP 10

Symantec has announced version 10 of its DLP product (formerly known as Vontu)  In a press release, Symantec touts DLP 10 as the

Symantec has announced Symantec Data Loss Prevention 10, the industry’s first open data loss prevention (DLP) platform, which aims to give customers more options to find and fix data loss problems. As organizations strive to center their security strategies around information, DLP becomes essential.

Symantec DLP has undergone various changes since they purchased Vontu all geared to making the product stronger and more useful for the security professional.

DLP 10 will “allow companies to apply encryption and enterprise rights management (ERM) based on content and will integrate with additional Symantec products.

One of the products DLP 10 will integrate with Symantec’s Workflow product to help build automatic response and workflows into the product.

DLP 10 will also support 25 languages and add full localization or Japanese, Simplified Chinese and also French.

DLP 10 will release to the public in December

Burton Group names Symantec, RSA, and Websense as best DLP vendors

Recently came across an article, from my Google News feed in regards to a recent study about DLP products.

A great point from the article is that DLP is no longer just concerned about monitoring the network and what happens there, there is an even bigger need to monitor data on the endpoint and also on file shares.  Data at Rest (DAR) is only a click away from being Data In Motion (DIM) and needs to be protected just as well.

Another interesting point is the convergence via acquisition that is occurring as the big companies are snapping up the smaller DLP players and integrating them into the existing product suite.

9 out of 10 firms??? – Really???

Saw this linked from Kevin Rowney, from Symantec, head of the DLP product and wanted to respond.

The article, “Nine out of 10 firms use data leakage prevention tools" and I wanted to respond “Oh Really?”   What exactly is their definition of data leakage tools?  A lot of the companies I work with and talk have no data loss prevention tools and in fact most of them don’t have anything budgeted in regards to these types of tools

A DLP purchase is often times not a budgeted purchase, but something that is driven by a business need and not an IT need.

Interested in DLP, drop me a note

Could DLP have saved Goldman Sachs from a big headache

In an article on Channel Insider, the author raises the question, Could a solid Data Loss Prevention product stopped the transfer of data from Goldman Sachs to a third part web hosting.

For those that don’t remember the whole story, a quick Google news search will be a quick refresher or from a New York Times article

“Mr. Aleynikov, who is free on $750,000 bond, is suspected of having taken pieces of Goldman software that enables the buying and selling of shares in milliseconds. Banks and hedge funds use such programs to profit from tiny price discrepancies among markets and in some instances leap in front of bigger orders.”

 

One key point of the article states

“DLP is often seen as the panacea for stopping the accidental or unauthorized release of data… Even the market-leading products by companies such as  Websense, Symantec, McAfee, RSA, CA and Trend Micro are limited to detecting mostly static data strings and content, such as Social Security numbers and credit card numbers.”

However this is not true within the Symantec DLP product.  Symantec acquired the market leader Vontu and rebranded it as Symantec DLP (for more information, drop me a note or visit their website). 

Symantec DLP can detect both structured and unstructured data based on the indexing technology it uses can track data such as source code, drawings or other intellectual property.

Let me give you an example of Symantec DLP protecting this type of data.  A client I was working with receives a PDF from subcontractors with payroll information on it.  This document needs to be either faxed in or brought in person, not emailed in.  Using the indexing technology of Symantec DLP, we indexed the PDF and created a policy saying if we saw X% of the PDF flag it as an incident.  We able to see several examples of this happening.

So there is the possibility of tracking unstructured data with Symantec DLP.