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ILPA
Information Leakage Prevention & Accountability
Main Elements of ILPA - Cryptography
Cryptography features are to ensure Confidentially,
Integrity, Authentication and Non-Repudiation, however
benefits are endless. A Chinese Wall model ( an ILP and
Information Isolation model) is best implemented using a
hybrid of Symmetric & Asymmetric encryption, the same
applies to a Unified Secured Single Logon Token. Most
Business owners & Security administrators take the
Features as the Benefits. Features are more of a goal of
Cryptography, where Benefits are every possible way of
applying Cryptography to solve a business dilemma.
Technical Fallacies - Data Owners vs. Custodians
Most CIO & CEO think of encryption as a luxurious
security need, however and by IT infrastructure
definition, there is no proper IT implementation without
Encryption.
The definition of Access Rights in a business model is
“The owner may be liable for negligence if they fail to
perform due diligence in establishing and enforcing
security policies to protect and sustain sensitive data.
A custodian is a subject who has been assigned or
delegated the day-to-day responsibility of proper
storage and protection of objects.
The owner is typically the CEO, president, or department
head. The custodian is typically the IT staff or the
system security administrator.”
On today’s implementation Custodians (IT Staff and
Security administrator) have more Access Rights than
Data Owners (CEO, president, or department head).
Custodians have access to read, write, modify and even
retransmit data.
Obstacles
There are technical obstacles that hindered the spread
of Cryptography to Business and various commercial
activities.
- Vendors Implementation
Though different crypto algorithm are publicly
available, most vendors find it hard to code it to an
application. There are several known implementation
flaws on today’s market.
- IT Department Implementation
IT Department/Administrators mostly will see it as an
overhead on the IT infrastructure, beside the fact that
Cryptography will require its own infrastructure, key
management system and Applications.
- User Acceptance.
In most cases users are required to change the way they
are doing business to include more steps in order to
implement encryption, nothing is fully automated or
offers ease of use to the that user. In short it did not
simplify business, rather than complicating it.
- Confidentiality
One of Cryptography features is to ensure
confidentiality, however how can you trust a closed
source ( a compile application) that is hooked online
like a sitting duck for 24/7, how do you ensure your own
provider does not have access to a mean to decrypt your
data and transmission!, how good it is, if you can’t
trust the very purpose you are implementing for.
Supplementary Elements of ILPA
- Information Flow and Design
- Application User Interface Control
- Policies supporting Information Leakage Prevention.
- Technical Controls enforcing the Policies.
- User-Land control to prevent malicious Trojans,
Sniffers, Key Loggers, Screen Spy.
Roadmap
Luckily enough there is a solution that fulfils all the
above required criteria and is targeting a
The roadmap starts with essential needs, such as
- Encrypting your own data before storing it locally or to
a Network File Server, Controlling the logon to your
workstation and Email encryption.
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Apply User-Land controls to prevent malicious activities
targeting end user.
- Review policies and controls in place.
- Review Technical Controls to prevent Information Leakage.
- Review Accountability Controls in Place.
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With infrastructure in place,
PKI can be integrated into DMS (Document Management
Systems) to ensure encrypting files before saving it on
the DMS server. Encrypting can be for yourself or
another colleague on the same enterprise or a client.
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PKI can be integrated into other Financial Applications
e.g. SAP, Oracle financial to ensure Accountability, 2
factor Authentication and network communication
encryption.
- Digitally Signing invoice, workflows or any other documents or process
- Services can be extended to provide clients access to critical applications such as access to their online banking, or sending Batch Processed Transfers
- Moreover, Cryptography can be applied to encrypt network communication of any application without the need to reprogram the application.
Strategy implementation depends on the size and number
of users concerned>
The priority of the next steps depends on the business
needs of the organization and it’s day to day operation.
Stay one step ahead
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