The New School of Information Security

What a delightful chapter title in Adam Shostack’s and Andrew Stewart’s new book, The New School of Information Security. They have produced a readable, compact tour of the information security field as it stands today – or perhaps as it lies in its crib. What we know intuitively the authors bring forward thoughtfully in their analysis of the information security industry: it is struggling to keep up with the defects in online communication, data storage, and business processes.

Shostack and Stewart helpfully review the stable of plagues on computing, communication, and remote commerce: spam, phishing, viruses, identity theft, and such. Likewise, they introduce the cast of characters in the security field, all of whom seem to be feeling along in the dark together.

Why are the lights off? Lack of data, they argue. Most information security decisions are taken in the absence of good information. The authors perceptively describe the substitutes for good information, like following trends, clinging to established brands, or chasing after studies produced by or for security vendors.

The authors revel in the breach data that has been made available to them thanks to disclosure laws like California’s SB 1386. A purist must quibble with mandated disclosure when common law can drive consumer protection more elegantly. But good data is good data, and the happenstance of its availability in the breach area is welcome.

In the most delightful chapter in the book (I’ve used it as the title of this review), Shostack and Stewart go through the some of the most interesting problems in information security. Technical problems are what they are. Economics, sociology, psychology, and the like are the disciplines that will actually frame the solutions for information security problems.

In subsequent chapters, Shostack and Stewart examine security spending and advocate for the “New School” approach to security. I would summarize theirs as a call for rigor, which is lacking today. It’s ironic that the world of information lacks for data about its own workings, and thus lacks sound decision-making methods, but there you go.

The book is a little heavy on “New School” talk. If the name doesn’t stick, Shostack and Stewart risk looking like they failed to start a trend. But it’s a trend that must take hold if information security is going to be a sound discipline and industry. I’m better aware for reading The New School of Information Security that info sec is very much in its infancy. The nurturing Shostack and Stewart recommend will help it grow.
Rating: 4 / 5

If you want to read a book that will have an influence on your information security career, or if you just want to read something that points out that we do need to do information security differently, then you need to go pick up a copy of “The new school of information security” by Adam Shostack and Andrew Stewart.

The book reads like this blog, everything from Noam Epple and the “Security Absurdity” with the response article Noam Eppel Follow up to Security Absurdity and Security Absurdity – Is information security “Broken”. All the way through some of the latest hacks from Two weeks, two security breaches in web 2.0 applications to Tom’s excellent article on Even Oracle is not without security problems. There are some short sharp jabs in the side for information security people and managers that think they are safe behind their firewalls.

If anything is going to serve as the cup of coffee after Noam Epple’s wake up call, it has to be this book. Which means you have to go buy it to get where we are going as an industry.

The New School of Information Security asks a lot of questions, that as a security community we need to answer. Everything from the value of the CISSP (is it just showing you can take a test, or does it really imply that the person knows something?), in a debate here that even people in the industry who love what we do can not answer. The idea of the CISSP is good, but the book speaks heresy, reliance on the CISSP is dangerous, dangerous to a company, it narrows the confines of the box when information security people need to be everywhere helping out.

The book also talks about issues within the company as simple as the firewall, to how programmers got around firewall blocks by routing programs over port 80, to the untrusted and trusted insider, to the fundamental bedrock of how we make decisions, the flawed and often meaningless statistics that come from research labs.

The whole industry is broken, and while we bask in our unregulated age, HIPAA, SOX, and other rules like PCI are just the shot across the bow on regulation, and more will be coming.

Programmers do not get it, neither do security folks. From requesting a 6 million dollar solution for a 30 minute test, to saying “no” to watching businesses move their IT requirements to Amazon EC2 or AWS, to dumping the traditional attitude – we are a group of people in trouble, and we need to read this book.

We need to shake up our communities, and the way that we work, not smarter, not harder, but working within the confines of realistic information security for the company that we are in. Best practices are just that, generic, you must tailor them for the risks that you have in your industry. To rely on Best Practices, NIST 800, ITIL, and other standards is to court disaster because no one is taking the specifics or unique issues of your particular industry.

They also talk about security appliances, vendors, trusted sites that have the branding truste and hacker safe, with some interesting comments on how those systems and certifications provide a false sense of security not just to the people running the site, but to the customers who visit them as well.

Much to ponder, some of it has shown up with the writers here at ITtoolbox as well, which is very nice, we have been talking about these very same issues for the last 2 years if you read this site. The book is a nice digest of what has been here, and available to folks who visit here or read via syndication or RSS.

Otherwise, we really will not need a “security industry” per say, we will just get rolled up into something else, and loose our unique and distinct culture.
Rating: 5 / 5

The New School of Information Security is one of the most timely and radical books on computer and information security that I’ve ever read. Adam Shostack and Andrew Stewart help to stimulate a significant paradigm shift that has been brewing in the infosec sphere for some time. With solid evidence and well grounded arguments Shostack and Stewart advocate for a new, and much needed, approach to information security: the New School.

Chapter 1 begins with a quick look at some prominent problems in the information security landscape today. By looking at spam, malware, identity theft, and computer breaches the authors provide a rough sketch of the current infosec landscape. Given the apparent failure of current approaches to security in the face of these threats the authors rhetorically pose the question of simply starting over and building a new approach from scratch before providing the opening sketch of their New School. The authors advocate the need for a new approach to computer security, the New School. The New School is described as quantifiable, “putting our ideas and beliefs through tests designed to draw out their flaws and limitations.” This concept of metrics and empiricism is a common thread throughout the book.

Chapter 2 describes the “scene,” or the state of the computer security industry today. By applying some elementary game theory the authors sketch out some of the dilemmas facing information security today. Then they delve into some of the historic origins of modern computer security. They point out that much of the computer security “conventional wisdom” has grown out of the military’s needs for computer security and how that foundation isn’t necessarily the best. They also explore the influence of hackers and crackers on the evolution of the industry. Finally they explore the relationship of capitalism and money to the field, including the driving factors of making money and how these have shaped the development of security today. The authors point out that while many good things have come from these various influences, they have also produced some unfortunate side effects that don’t necessarily have to be taken for granted. The chapter goes on to examine the economy of the security industry, including the idea of “best practices” (which the authors very roundly decry) as well as turnkey solutions. The authors also point out the difficulty in measuring security products given the lack of objective test data produced in the sector. The chapter concludes with the though that “without proper use of objective data to test our ideas, we can’t tell if we are mistaken or misguided in our judgement.” They provide further evidence that the industry as a whole isn’t often guided by any sort of quantifiable data (thus removing the ‘science’ from computer science) and that all too often “conventional wisdom” is misguided and sometimes blatantly wrong because it lacks a solid empirical foundation.

Chapter 3 looks at some of the underpinnings of gathering solid scientific evidence with which to test the ideas of the New School. Without good evidence, they point out, it is nearly impossible to make accurate decisions. The authors point out the problems with much of the evidence used to support common claims in computer security, including surveys, and show the bias present in much of the survey data used to justify security decision making. The chapter goes on to lament the lack of an objective trade press in the industry and then delves into the vulnerability discovery lifecycle that drives much of computer security. The authors examine how vulnerabilities are discovered, how vendors often ignore flaws in their products in their rush to market, and the fact that there are sometimes problems with using vulnerability reports as solid metrics for security. The chapter then goes on to examine how data about security can be collected, either by hobbyists or individuals. Ultimately, the authors lament the fact that much of the data collected about security isn’t shared with the community and thus it becomes nearly impossible to make better decisions. The lack of objective, available data makes it extremely difficult for us to draw reliable conclusions based on trends or quantify the current state of security.

Chapter 4 looks at security breaches and specifically argues for the benefits of breach notification as one of the best ways to produce quantifiable metrics in security. The authors point out that breach notification rarely has long term consequences to a companies stock price or customer loyalty and the benefit of breach data would be invaluable to researchers. The authors argue that breach notification is a key component to the outlook of the New School. In joining the New School organizations have to learn “to focus on observation and objective measurement.” They argue that only by doing so can we move information security from an art to a science. They say that while “it is true that computer security consists of a fog of moving parts…complex problems do get solved. Investigators bring a broad set of analytic techniques ranging from explanatory psychology…to complex economic models.” At this point in the book the authors begin to introduce another key component of the New School, that is the need for integration of other fields of study into computer security. The authors argue that by utilizing approaches and theories developed in the fields of psychology, economics, sociology, and other academic areas our understanding of information security can be broadened and greatly enhanced. They always come back to ideas of empiricism, however, stating that “the core aspect of scientific research – the ability to gather objective data against which to test hypotheses – has been largely missing from information security.” The authors emphasize that not only does data need to be collected, it must also be shared in order to aid in our understanding of the data.

Chapter 5 begins to draw upon outside fields of academia to enhance the New School. This chapter begins by introducing several economic models and explaining how they influence information security. While economic approaches to security are nothing new (risk mitigation, calculations of value and exposure equaling risk, etc.) the New School argues that “because computers are inevitably employed within a larger world, information security as a discipline must embrace lessons from a far wider field.” The authors argue that economic models don’t only have to be applied at a macro level to computer security, but can also be applied to more compartmentalized security problems (such as getting users to select good passwords). They also examine the success potential of certain security products based on economic analysis. The chapter goes on to discuss how lessons from psychology can be incorporated into our security decision making and to help us understand computer security more fully. Finally the chapter draws on lessons from sociology and shows how they too can inform our understanding of security.

Chapter 6 focuses on spending. The chapter is devoted to examining how organizations spend their money on information security and why. Like the earlier chapters, this one applies the New School approach to attempt to analyze spending habits and challenges many of the foundational logic that supports common security spending plans. The chapter draws on lessons from economics and psychology to examine the patterns of spending and suggests some ways in which we can improve our spending on security. Ultimately the authors argue that we understand the factors that should influence spending and focus our efforts on the most quantifiably effective expenditures of money.

Chapter 7, or Life in the New School, discusses many of the challenges facing the New School. These range from the lack of quality data to the dearth of a standardized security vocabulary. This chapter mainly points out the challenges that lie ahead and the many ways that a new approach can help overcome them.

Chapter 8 is a blanket call to join the New School along with instructions for how to begin. The authors argue that New School proponents should collect good data, analyze that data and seek new perspectives. They point out that the New School draws from a diverse body of academic knowledge and advocates synthesizing work from other academic area into the New School approach. Ultimately the New School challenges us to change how we think about information security. Not only should we question the “conventional wisdom” we take for granted, but we should also seek out new hypothesis and ways to test them in order to expand our understanding of computer security as a whole.

The book is an easy read and make quite an impression. Shostack and Stewart lead the charge towards a more empirical approach to computer security. The field has matured enough that we should begin treating it seriously, and in order to do so we need to be able to speak authoritatively about issues. The voodoo of conventional wisdom is no longer good enough when making recommendations as experts. We need to be able to point to solid evidence to justify security strategies and implementations. We also need to be able to look at quantifiable data when evaluating new products and tools. Ultimately I see the field moving in this direction and I give kudos to Shostack and Steward for issuing this clarion call to an industry that will hopefully take their message to heart.
Rating: 5 / 5

The New School’s thesis is straightforward: publish data and use that data to approach IT security questions with a more scientific mindset, utilizing other academic disciplines such as economics and psychology to aid in solving problems.

The book would be a great primer for an MBA course on IT systems and organizational behavior. I suspect that so much of what causes secrecy around breaches in business organizations are the overblown fears of MBAs of customers fleeing. Shostack and Stewart do a good job calming those fears, and showing how disclosure really helps all parties move toward better security.

The book is a quick read, and it’s more of a philosophical treatise than a how-to manual. For that reason I think it would be beneficial for anyone in IT or an organization’s management to read it, as the book speaks to both parties.

I should disclose that I’ve known Adam Shostack for years, I do not know Andrew Stewart.
Rating: 5 / 5

It is 2008 and never has so much been spent in information security. Year after year, more and more security hardware and software is purchased, more and more security professionals are hired, and more security is done; yet things are not getting better. Every indicator, every pundit, everything points to more security breaches, vulnerabilities and incidents. Large amounts of proprietary data are compromised on a daily basis. Obviously something is wrong, yet the entire industry goes along thinking things are getting better and more secure. Obviously something needs to change. And that new change is what The New School of Information Security attempts to conceive.

Far too much of the security industry has its roots in FUD. Billions of dollars of information security products have been sold, and for what? The book asks why is information security so dysfunctional and why companies are often wasting so much money on security. So what is this thing called the new school? The authors define it as neither a service nor a product; rather it is a new approach that uses the scientific method and objective data. This in turn gives an entirely new perspective from diverse fields to make effective security decisions. The authors rightly believe that when objective data is used, it enables better decision-making.

The New School of Information Security is a ground-breaking text in that it attempts to remove the reader from the hype of information security, and enables the reader to focus on the realities of security. The fact that such a book needs to be written in 2008 shows the sorry state of information security.

The book starts out with observations of why there are so many failures within information security. Anyone with experience in security can easily relate to these issues. One recurring theme throughout the book is that poor data, be it research or advertising negatively effects the state of security. The authors astutely note that security advertising often does a disservice to the security field because it glosses over complex problems and presents the illusions of a reality in which a security panacea exists. It makes the buyer believe they can reach that panacea by using their service or purchasing their product.

In creating their new school, the authors have no qualms in attacking the dogma of the current state of information security. From Gartner to the Executive Alliance and more, the authors show that these groups and more often suffer from issues such as bias, lack of a scientific method and more. The book notes that the search for objective data on information security is at the heart of the philosophy of the new school. Since there is a drought of objective data today, the book asks how can we know that the conventional wisdom is the right thing to do? The observation is that the current state of affairs is unsustainable for the commercial security industry and for security practitioners.

The title of chapter 5 gives away the theme of the book — Amateurs Study Cryptography — Professionals Study Economics. The idea is that information security must do a better job of embracing such diverse fields as economics, psychology, sociology and more, to make effective decisions.

In some ways, the authors are perhaps too aggressive in their desire for security statistics. One of the most scientific approaches to information security is from CERT [...]. Yet the authors are not satisfied with CERT’s findings that the majority of incidents appear to be insider based. Given what data and statistics we have in 2008, the figures from CERT are certainly good enough. Yes, they could be better, and yes, breach data is not actuarial data, but given the data from CERT, combined with recent news and court cases (UBS, Société Générale,etc.) clearly show that insiders are the most insidious threat.

Also, while the current state of information security is indeed less than perfect, the authors are a bit too condescending of areas where security is formalized (ISO 27001, etc.), yet not perfect.

After years of countless 1,000+ page massive security books, The New School of Information Security succinctly spreads its message in a brief 160 pages. In those 160 pages, the author’s detail at a high-level what needs to be done to create this new school. Therein lays the books only flaw, its brevity. The authors want to get the concept of the new school out there, but they do not detail enough of the necessary requirement to make it work. They show with clarity how things are broken, but don’t do enough to show how to fix it. Let’s hope the authors are at work on a follow-up writing those necessary additions.

Some Slashdot readers are likely to question how an author (Shostack) can write a book on security while being employed by Microsoft. Even with all its security issues, what many do not realize is that no software company has spent more on security in the past decade than Microsoft. Indeed they have a lot of catching up to do, but it is being done. Put another way, Microsoft has likely spent more on security than China has spent on democracy.

Too much of information security is clearly broke and The New School of Information Security is about fixing it. The author’s pragmatic approach is a refreshing respite from years of security product based FUD and silver-bullet solutions. The approach of the new school is one that screams out to be put into place. It is the job of today’s CISO’s and CIO’s to heed that call, take the initiative, and lead their organizations there. Either they graduate their staff from the new school, or we are faced with more decades of information security failures.

Let’s hope The New School of Information Security is indeed a new start for information security. The book is practical and pragmatic, and one of the most important security books of the last few years. Those serious about information security should definitely read it, and encourage others to do the same.
Rating: 5 / 5