Thor's Study Guide - CISSP Domain 6
Thor's Study Guide - CISSP Domain 6
Introduction to Domain 6
In this domain we cover:
• Assessment and test strategies.
▪ How and what do want to test? Which type of tests do we use, and do we want
intrusive or non-intrusive?
• Audit Strategies for Cloud and Hybrid Environments.
• Security process data (e.g., management and operational controls).
▪ Are our administrative processes as secure as we think they are, and as they
should be?
• Security control testing.
▪ We test both the technical and administrative controls we have in place.
• Test outputs (e.g., automated, manual).
▪ How we report our findings, we need to do this as effectively as possible.
▪ We in layman’s terms convey what the vulnerabilities and test results mean to
senior management.
• Security architecture vulnerabilities.
This chapter focuses on how we assess and test the security measures we have in place, this is done to
ensure we are as secure as we think we are and to improve our security posture.
Domain 6 makes up 12% of the exam questions.
2|Page
https://thorteaches.com/
Thor’s Study Guide – CISSP® Domain 6
⬧ Security audits.
• Security Audit: A test against a published standard.
▪ SOC 2 Type 1 or 2, PCI-DSS, HIPAA…
• Internal, external, and 3rd-Party Audits:
▪ Unstructured Audits (internal):
⬧ Internal auditors to improve our security and find flaws, often done
before an external audit.
▪ External audits:
⬧ Similar to internal audits. An external company audits our controls to
find flaws and improve our security posture.
▪ Structured Audits (3rd party):
⬧ External auditors who validate our compliance, often done for a
regulatory body, they are experts and the audit adds credibility.
⬧ Can also be a knowledge transfer for the organization, required annually
in many organizations.
• SOC1: Focus on service organization controls relevant to internal control over financial
reporting.
▪ For internal use and available to the organization.
▪ Type I: Opinion on design effectiveness of controls. Type I, cover single point in
time.
▪ Type II: Opinion on design and reporting effectiveness of controls. Type II,
covers a minimum six month time period.
3|Page
https://thorteaches.com/
Thor’s Study Guide – CISSP® Domain 6
4|Page
https://thorteaches.com/
Thor’s Study Guide – CISSP® Domain 6
5|Page
https://thorteaches.com/
Thor’s Study Guide – CISSP® Domain 6
6|Page
https://thorteaches.com/
Thor’s Study Guide – CISSP® Domain 6
Vulnerability Scanning/Testing
• A vulnerability scanner tool is used to scan a network or system for a list of predefined
vulnerabilities such as system misconfiguration, outdated software, or a lack of
patching.
• It is very important to understand the output from a vulnerability scan, they can be
100's of pages for some systems, and how do the vulnerabilities map to Threats and
Risks (Risk = Threat x Vulnerability).
• When we understand the true Risk, we can then plan our mitigation.
• Common vulnerability scanners could be Nessus or OpenVAS, both list vulnerabilities in
Critical, High, Medium, Low, and Informational.
7|Page
https://thorteaches.com/
Thor’s Study Guide – CISSP® Domain 6
8|Page
https://thorteaches.com/
Thor’s Study Guide – CISSP® Domain 6
9|Page
https://thorteaches.com/
Thor’s Study Guide – CISSP® Domain 6
▪ Compliance Checks:
⬧ Are the security controls we put in place sufficient to ensure compliance
with the regulations that our organization must follow? (PCI-DSS, HIPAA,
SOC2, and so on).
⬧ Audits can be part of it, but they are a point-in-time event, whereas
compliance checks are ongoing, and compliance should be the
beginning of our risk management program.
▪ Think like an attacker would, start with the easiest attack first, the users.
▪ Low technical tools can be just as effective as sophisticated tools,
▪ Many organizations have strong perimeter defense, but no defense in depth,
once you get past 1 or 2 barriers you can access most things.
▪ Social Engineering uses people skills to bypass security controls.
⬧ Can be used in a combination with many other attacks, especially client-
side attacks or physical tests.
⬧ Attacks are often more successful if they use one or more of these
approaches:
▫ Authority (someone you trust or are afraid of) - Look and
sound like an authority figure, be in charge, this can be in a
uniform or a suit. Most effective with impersonation, whaling,
and vishing attacks.
10 | P a g e
https://thorteaches.com/
Thor’s Study Guide – CISSP® Domain 6
▪ War Dialing:
⬧ Uses modem to dial a series of phone numbers, looking for an
answering modem carrier tone, the penetration tester then attempts to
access the answering system.
⬧ Not really done anymore, but know it for the exam.
▪ War Driving (access point mapping):
⬧ Driving or walking around, mapping access points and trying to gain
access to them.
▪ Network Attacks
⬧ Client-side attacks, server-side attacks, or Web application attacks.
▪ Wireless Tests:
⬧ Evaluate the risk related to potential access to your wireless network.
⬧ Uses the password combination & sniffing technique for cracking
unsecured wireless network, so a proper set up is required for making
the whole process semi-automated and automated.
11 | P a g e
https://thorteaches.com/
Thor’s Study Guide – CISSP® Domain 6
▪ Exception Handling:
⬧ An exception is raised or thrown when an application encounters an
error (programming error, division by zero, invalid argument, creating
an object when the system is out of memory, and so on).
⬧ Most applications would by default terminate, but an exception handler
can stop that.
▪ Ethical Disclosure:
⬧ As IT Security professionals, we need to act ethically — disclose
unknown vulnerabilities discovered during security testing.
⬧ We'd most likely put in place compensating controls to address the
vulnerability.
⬧ We'd notify the vendor, giving them time to create a patch or other
form of fix (white hat).
⬧ If they do not act, we may disclose it to a larger audience; however, this
raises security concerns now that attackers are aware of the
vulnerability — they can attack before others have applied to
compensate controls or repair.
• Software Testing:
▪ Historically we have built functional software and tested it for just that stability
and functionality, security has been an afterthought if considered at all.
Software needs to be designed securely, built in not bolted on.
▪ Normal software can have millions of line of code and about 1% of that contains
vulnerabilities.
▪ Many security breaches happen because our software is easy to compromise.
▪ Static Testing - Passively testing the code, it is not running.
⬧ This is walkthroughs, syntax checking, and code reviews.
⬧ Looks at the raw source code itself looking for evidence of known
insecure practices, functions, libraries, or other characteristics having
been used in the source code.
⬧ There are 100's of static code analysis tools available depending on
programming language.
▪ Dynamic Testing – Actively testing the code while executing it.
⬧ Can uncover flaws that exist in the particular implementation and
interaction of code that static analysis missed. Software can run and
code execute with flaws.
▪ Code testing uses white and black box terms just like in Pen testing.
12 | P a g e
https://thorteaches.com/
Thor’s Study Guide – CISSP® Domain 6
13 | P a g e
https://thorteaches.com/
Thor’s Study Guide – CISSP® Domain 6
14 | P a g e
https://thorteaches.com/
Thor’s Study Guide – CISSP® Domain 6
▪ Now that we have completed our tests, just like on our log reviews, we need to
use it and analyze the data we got from the testing.
▪ It can be huge amounts of data, and we need to prioritize what we act on first,
what is acceptable and what is not.
▪ Think of the qualitative risk analysis, if it is low likelihood and low impact we
may leave it alone and focus on higher priority items.
15 | P a g e
https://thorteaches.com/
Thor’s Study Guide – CISSP® Domain 6
• Social engineering attacks exploit human psychology and manipulate individuals into
disclosing sensitive information or granting unauthorized access.
▪ Techniques such as authority, intimidation, consensus, scarcity, urgency, and
familiarity are commonly used in social engineering attacks.
• Software testing is crucial for identifying and addressing vulnerabilities in code,
ensuring that security is built-in rather than bolted-on.
▪ Different levels (unit, integration, component interface) and types (installation,
regression, fuzzing, all-pairs, misuse case) of testing help uncover various types
of defects and vulnerabilities.
• Analyzing test results and prioritizing remediation efforts based on risk is essential for
effectively improving an organization's security posture.
▪ A risk-based approach ensures that resources are allocated to addressing the
most critical vulnerabilities and threats first.
16 | P a g e
https://thorteaches.com/