Skip to Content.
Sympa Menu

internetworkers - Re: [internetworkers] CryptOS

internetworkers AT lists.ibiblio.org

Subject: Internetworkers: http://www.ibiblio.org/internetworkers/

List archive

Chronological Thread  
  • From: "Alan MacHett" <machett AT ibiblio.org>
  • To: internetworkers AT lists.ibiblio.org
  • Subject: Re: [internetworkers] CryptOS
  • Date: Tue, 23 Dec 2003 13:33:48 -0500 (EST)

Tanner Lovelace said:
> Well, I don't think you'll have any luck right now with the hardware,
> but as far as the software goes, have you looked into SELinux? It
> was created by the NSA to be a secure version of linux. Linux
> Journal just ran an article recently about someone who put an
> installation of it on the net, gave out the root password, and
> people still failed to be able to crack it. It secures everything,
> even from root. Google should know where it is. :-)
>

Food for Thought:

http://www.nsa.gov/selinux/faq.html

<quotation>
13. Is it secure?

The notion of a secure system includes many attributes (e.g., physical
security, personnel security, etc.) and Security-enhanced Linux addresses
only a very narrow set of these attributes (i.e., mandatory access
controls in the operating system). Put another way, "secure system" means
safe enough to protect some real world information from some real world
adversary that the information owner and/or user care about.
Security-enhanced Linux is only a research prototype that is intended to
demonstrate mandatory controls in a modern operating system like Linux and
thus is very unlikely to meet any interesting definition of secure system.
We do believe that the technology demonstrated in Security-enhanced Linux
will be valuable to people that are building secure systems.


15.Will Security-enhanced Linux be evaluated by the CCEVS?

Security-enhanced Linux has not been evaluated and there are no current
plans to have it evaluated. Security-enhanced Linux is not designed to
address a complete set of security concerns as represented by a protection
profile. Although it would be possible to evaluate its current
functionality, we believe such an evaluation would have limited value. We
do look forward to insightful reviews and critiques of the work as part of
working with the Linux development community. We also hope to work with
others to incorporate this technology into a more complete system that
would be a more appropriate and useful target of evaluation. (For more
information about CCEVS evaluation, visit their web site at
http://niap.nist.gov/cc-scheme/.)


16.Did you try to fix any vulnerabilities?

No, we did not look for or find any vulnerabilities in the course of our
work. We only changed enough to add our new mechanisms.


17.Is it approved for government use?

Security-enhanced Linux is not part of any currently approved version of
Linux and has no special or additional approval for government use over
any other version of Linux.
</quotation>




Archive powered by MHonArc 2.6.24.

Top of Page