Assessing and Exploiting Control Systems

This is not your traditional SCADA/ICS/IoT security course! How many courses send you home with your own PLC and a set of hardware/RF hacking tools?!? This course teaches hands-on penetration testing techniques used to test individual components of a control system, including embedded electronic field devices, network protocols, RF communications, Human Machine Interfaces (HMIs), and various forms of master servers and their ICS applications. Skills you will learn in this course will apply directly to systems such as the Smart Grid, PLCs, RTUs, smart meters, building management, manufacturing, Home Area Networks (HAN), smart appliances, SCADA, substation automation, and synchrophasors. This course is structured around the formal penetration testing methodology created by UtiliSec for the United States Department of Energy. Using this methodology and Control Things Pentest Platform (previously SamuraiSTFU), an open source Linux distribution for pentesting energy sector systems and other critical infrastructure, we will perform hands-on penetration testing tasks on user interfaces (on master servers and field device maintenance interfaces), control system protocols (modbus, DNP3, IEC 60870-5-104), RF communications (433MHz, 869MHz, 915MHz), and embedded circuit attacks (memory dumping, bus snooping, JTAG, and firmware analysis). We will tie these techniques and exercises back to control system devices that can be tested using these techniques. The course exercises will be performed on a mixture of real world and simulated devices to give students the most realistic experience as possible in a portable classroom setting.

Advances in modern control systems such as the energy sector’s Smart Grid has brought great benefits for asset owners/operators and customers alike, however these benefits have often come at a cost from a security perspective. With increased functionality and addition inter-system communication, modern control systems bring a greater risk of compromise that vendors, asset owners/operators, and society in general must accept to realize the desired benefits. To minimize this risk, penetration testing in conjunction with other security assessment types must be performed to minimize vulnerabilities before attackers can exploit critical infrastructures that exist in all countries around the world. Ultimately, this is the goal of this course, to help you know how, when, and where this can be done safely in your control systems.

Objectives

• Attendees will be able to explain the steps and methodology used in performing penetration tests on Industrial Control and Smart Grid systems.
• Attendees will be able to use the free and open source tools in SamuraiSTFU to discover and identify vulnerabilities in web applications.
• Attendees will be able to exploit several hardware, network, user interface, and server-side vulnerabilities.

Course Content

Introduction to the NESCOR methodology for penetration testing

• Preparing for a penetration test
• Architecture reviews
• Pentesting the master servers
• Pentesting the user interfaces
• Pentesting the network communications
• Pentesting the embedded field devices
• End-­‐to-­‐end assessment
• Reporting

Introduction to SamuraiSTFU (Security Testing Framework for Utilities)

• Setting up the virtual machine
• Walk through the tools and functionality
• Introduction to the student hardware kits

Performing traditional network pentests on control systems

• Overview of a traditional network penetration test methodology
• Dangers of port and vulnerability scanning
• Strategies to perform port and vulnerability scanning

Types of ICS user interfaces

• Traditional applications
• Web applications
• Terminal interfaces

Pentesting Different Communication Layers

• Testing of communication mediums vs communication protocols
• Where security defenses should be place …… and tested

Serial communications

• RS-485 and RS-232
• Modbus RTU
• 16-bit unsigned registers and single bit coils

Pentesting RF communications between master servers and field devices

• Hands-on RF spectrum analysis and signal capture
• Spread Spectrum types and strategies
• Hands-on signal demodulation with GNU Radio
• Hands-on network traffic extraction
• Traffic transmission and exploitation

Pentesting TCP/IP based ICS protocols

• Protocol capture and analysis
• modbus, DNP3, IEC 61850, ICCP, ZigBee, C37.118, and C12.22
• Dealing with unknown protocols
• Hands-on entropy analysis of network payloads
• Reverse engineering unknown protocols
• Hands-on ICS protocol fuzzing

Pentesting technician interfaces on ICS field and floor devices

• Functional analysis of field technician interfaces
• Hands-on exercise capturing USB communications to tech interfaces
• Hands-on exercise analyzing captured USB communications
• Impersonating endpoints in field tech interface communications
• Hands-on exercises fuzzing AMI Smart Meter c12.18 optical interfaces
• Exploiting vulnerabilities found during analysis

Analyzing field and floor device firmware

• Obtaining field and floor device firmware
• Hands-on exercise disassembling firmware
• Hands-on exercise analyzing disassembled firmware
• Exploiting firmware flaws

Overview of pentesting field and floor device embedded circuits

• Local attack through physically exposed devices
• Expanding physical attacks to remote attacks
• Cryptographic keys and firmware

Analysis of embedded electronics in ICS field and floor devices

• Discussion of device disassembly
• Component analysis on embedded circuits
• Datasheet acquisition and analysis for target components

Dumping data at rest on embedded circuits

• Using the Bus Pirate and other similar tools
• Overview of I2C or two-wire serial protocol
• Hands-on exercise dumping I2C EEPROMs
• Overview of SPI serial protocol
• Hands-on exercise dumping SPI EEPROMs
• Overview of JTAG
• Hands-on exercise interfacing with JTAG

Bus Snooping on embedded circuits

• Overview of bus snooping
• Hands-on exercise snooping busses

Analyzing data obtained from data dumping and bus snooping

• Hands-on exercise doing string analysis of datasets
• Hands-on exercise doing entropy analysis of datasets
• Hands-on exercise doing systematic key searches through datasets
• Hands-on exercise doing file carving from datasets

Requirements

Basic penetration testing experience is desirable, but not required. It is assumed that attendees will have no knowledge of ICS, Smart Grid, SCADA, or critical infrastructure. This course is designed for intermediate level security professionals, be they engineers, technicians, analysts, managers, or penetration testers.

Recommended read

For those with little or no ICS experience, these Wikipedia articles provide a brief introduction to the concepts and history of control systems that will be helpful to know for class.

• http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ICS
• http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SCADA
• http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Distributed_control_system
• http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Smart_grid

http://csrc.nist.gov/publications/nistpubs/800-82/SP800-82-final.pdf - NIST 800-82 is a great introduction to industrial control systems and the security issues surrounding them.

http://nostarch.com/xboxfree - While this has nothing to do with control systems, it provides a great introduction to the concepts and techniques taught in this class to pentest embedded electronic hardware in ICS field/floor devices.

Software and hardware requirements

• Laptop with at least two USB ports (three ports preferred). If only two USB ports exist on the laptop and they are right next to each other (such as found on a Macbook Air), a USB extension cable must be brought as well
• Latest VMware Player, VMware Workstation, VWware Fusion installed. Other virtualization software such as Parallels or VirtualBox may work if the attendee is familiar with its functionality, however VMware Player should be prepared as a backup just in case
• Access to an account with administrative permissions and the ability to disable all security software on their laptop such as Antivirus and/or firewalls if needed for the class
• At least thirty (30) GB of free hard drive space
• At least four (4) GB of RAM, preferably eight (8) GB of RAM

Provided at the course

The following items are provided to each student to use in class and take home with them:

• Programmable Logic Controller (PLC)
• Software to program the PLC to keep (non-expiring)
• Software to program an HMI for the PLC (non-expiring)
• Buspirate with probes and EEPROMS for exercises
• Software Defined Radio (SDR)
• 915MHz or 898Mhz based access point and remote device for exercises
• MSP430 Launchpad for Firmware exercises
• Latest version of the Control Things Pentest Platform on DVD or USB
• Power for your laptop
• Internet connectivity may or may not be available depending on the facility hosting the course
• PDF version of the course slide deck

Trainer Biography

Justin Searle is the Managing Partner of UtiliSec, specializing in ICS security architecture design and penetration testing. Justin led the Smart Grid Security Architecture group in the creation of NIST Interagency Report 7628 and has played key roles in the Advanced Security Acceleration Project for the Smart Grid (ASAP-SG), National Electric Sector Cybersecurity Organization Resources (NESCOR), and Smart Grid Interoperability Panel (SGIP). Justin has taught courses in hacking techniques, forensics, networking, and intrusion detection for multiple universities, corporations, and security conferences.

Mr. Searle is currently a certified instructor for the SANS Institute. In addition to electric power industry conferences, Justin frequently presents at top international security conferences such as Black Hat, DEFCON, OWASP, Nullcon, and AusCERT. Justin co-leads prominent open source projects including the Samurai Web Testing Framework (SamuraiWTF), the Samurai Security Testing Framework for Utilities (SamuraiSTFU), Yokoso!, and Laudanum. Justin has an MBA in International Technology and is a CISSP and SANS GIAC certified Incident Handler (GCIH), Intrusion Analyst (GCIA), Web Application Penetration Tester (GWAPT), and GIAC Industrial Control Security Professional (GICSP).

More information on his security blog.

@meeas

Links :
http://www.utilisec.com

Mon. 24 - 26 October 2016 (09:00 - 17:00)

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