Re: [Openjnlp-devel] Another update on Elvis

[Christopher H. <he...@ez...>]

On Sunday 12 May 2002 01:20 pm, Kevin Herrboldt wrote:
> ...This falls into the "security by
> obscurity" category and seems more secure than it actually is. I'm not
> saying it's a bad thing to do, but I'd recommend focusing more on secure
> message passing.

I agree, somewhat.  However, it's very easy to implement (three lines of 
code), and I generally tend to favor anything that makes life more difficult 
to the casual cracker.  It's not so much "security through obscurity" as 
"slightly increased security through increased hassle".  The more of a pain 
you make things for script-kiddies, the less likely they are to trouble you.  
This means you can devote more of those lying-awake-worrying nights to the 
serious cracker.

Also, at least on the machine I'm using at the moment (running Mandrake 8.2 
x86 distro), doesn't reveal anything particularly Elvis related about the 
port, although it is possible to identify that a java program of some kind is 
using the port.  An attacker would still have to probe a number of possible 
ports in an attempt to spoof Elvis - thus increasing his exposure and risk of 
detection.  Yeh, I know, 99% of the population doesn't do anything to detect 
such attacks anyway....


>Is Elvis listening on 127.0.0.1 only?

I have no idea how I could have been so stupid as to miss that, but I did.  
Thanks!

					Chris