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Deviant Security the Technical Computer Security Practices of Cyber Criminals

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Deviant Security the Technical Computer Security Practices of Cyber Criminals This electronic thesis or dissertation has been downloaded from Explore Bristol Research, http://research-information.bristol.ac.uk Author: Van De Sandt, Erik Title: Deviant Security The Technical Computer Security Practices of Cyber Criminals. General rights Access to the thesis is subject to the Creative Commons Attribution - NonCommercial-No Derivatives 4.0 International Public License. A copy of this may be found at https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/legalcode This license sets out your rights and the restrictions that apply to your access to the thesis so it is important you read this before proceeding. Take down policy Some pages of this thesis may have been removed for copyright restrictions prior to having it been deposited in Explore Bristol Research. However, if you have discovered material within the thesis that you consider to be unlawful e.g. breaches of copyright (either yours or that of a third party) or any other law, including but not limited to those relating to patent, trademark, confidentiality, data protection, obscenity, defamation, libel, then please contact [email protected] and include the following information in your message: •Your contact details •Bibliographic details for the item, including a URL •An outline nature of the complaint Your claim will be investigated and, where appropriate, the item in question will be removed from public view as soon as possible. Deviant Security: The Technical Computer Security Practices of Cyber Criminals. Erik H.A. van de Sandt 26th April 2019 Acknowledgments What an exciting journey it has been to research deviant security practices while chasing some of the world’s most serious and organized cyber criminals. First of all, I thank my amazing supervisor Professor Awais Rashid. You are the perfect example of what impact a cheerful attitude towards life can have on other people. Thank you for your advice, inspiration and support. To all my national and international law-enforcement colleagues with whom I worked during this project, I salute you. The true diversity in backgrounds, cultures and ideas, yet feeling as one big family on a mission, is a bless to me. I could not have done this without you. I love the remark of one of my colleagues who read a first version, and said: ‘You basically wrote down what we do, see and discuss on a daily basis’. That is indeed true, and I hope my thesis shows to readers how intellectually satisfying our work is while serving the values of secular liberal democracy. Gert R., Marijn S., Pim T. and Wilbert P., thank you for facilitating me at work. Because of my family and especially my partner S., this felt like fun. Only once, I was insecure about the project, but with your love and support we managed to get me back on track within a week. Thank you. Abstract The dominant academic and practitioners’ perspective on security evolves around law-abiding referent objects of security who are under attack by law-breaking threat agents. This study turns the current perspective around and presents a new security paradigm. Suspects of crime have threat agents as well, and are therefore in need of security. The study takes cyber criminals as referent objects of security, and researches their technical computer security practices. While their protective practices are not necessarily deemed criminal by law, security policies and mechanisms of cyber criminals frequently deviate from prescribed bonafide cyber security standards. As such, this study is the first to present a full picture on these deviant security practices, based on unique access to pub- lic and confidential secondary data related to some of the world’s most serious and organized cyber criminals. Besides describing the protection of crime and the criminal, the observed practices are explained by the economics of deviant security: a combination of technical computer security principles and microe- conomic theory. The new security paradigm lets us realize that cyber criminals have many countermeasures at their disposal in the preparation, pre-activity, activity and post-activity phases of their modi operandi. Their controls are not only driven by technical innovations, but also by cultural, economical, legal and political dimensions on a micro, meso and macro level. Deviant security is very much democratized, and indeed one of the prime causes of today’s efficiency and effectiveness crisis in police investigations. Yet every modus operandi comes with all kinds of minor, major and even unavoidable weaknesses, and therefore suggestions are made how police investigations can exploit these vulnerabilities and promote human security as a public good for all citizens. Ultimately, the findings of this socio-technical-legal project prove that deviant security is an academic field of study on its own with continually evolving research opportu- nities. Contents Contents iii List of Figures vi List of Tables viii Nomenclature ix 1 Introduction 1 1.1 Research Direction & Objectives . .4 1.2 Significance of Study . .6 1.3 Approach . .7 1.4 Novel Contributions . .7 1.5 Outline of Study . .8 I Literature Review 11 2 Current ‘Good Guy’ Perspectives on Security 12 2.1 Security as an Ongoing Process . 13 2.2 Current Perspective on Technical Computer Security . 15 2.3 Current Perspectives on Cyber Security & Cyber Crimes . 17 2.3.1 Why Cyber Crime is (not) Cyber Security . 17 2.3.2 Border-Centric View on Cyber Security & Cyber Crimes 19 2.3.3 Borderless View on Cyber Security & Cyber Crimes . 22 2.4 Interim Conclusion and Discussion . 25 3 Touching upon Security Controls of Cyber Criminals 27 3.1 Computer Science & Engineering Literature . 28 3.1.1 Anti-Forensics . 28 3.1.2 Botnet Protection . 31 3.1.3 Authorship Analysis . 34 3.1.4 Attacker Economics..................... 36 3.1.5 Interim Conclusion & Discussion . 38 3.2 Social Science Literature . 39 iii 3.3 Legal Studies . 42 3.4 Interim Conclusion and Discussion . 45 II Methodology 47 4 A Multidisciplinary Approach for Deviant Security 48 4.1 Descriptive: Grounded Theory for Deviant Security Practices . 50 4.1.1 Cyber Criminal and Cyber Security Participants . 52 4.1.2 Secondary Data Sources . 55 4.1.3 Data Collection, Analysis and Writing . 59 4.2 Explanatory: Information Age & Microeconomic Theory . 61 4.2.1 Deviant Security in the Information Age . 61 4.2.2 The Microeconomics of Deviant Security . 64 4.3 Limitations . 66 4.4 Ethical issues . 71 III Research Findings 73 5 What? - Basic Qualities of Deviant Security 74 5.1 Definition: What Makes Security Deviant? . 76 5.2 Meaning: Subjective Condition . 83 5.3 Provision: Club, Common, Private and Public Good . 86 5.4 Function: An Asset To Protect Assets . 89 5.5 Form: Intangible and Tangible Products & Services . 96 5.6 Interim Conclusion and Discussion . 102 6 Who? - Interactive Qualities of Deviant Security 105 6.1 Autarkic & Autonomous Referent Objects . 106 6.2 DevSec Providers & Services . 108 6.3 Threat Agents & Attacks . 113 6.4 Information Asymmetries in Intertwined Networks........ 117 6.5 Deception as Deviant Security Control . 125 6.6 Trust and Distrust as Deviant Security Controls......... 132 6.7 Interim Conclusion and Discussion................. 144 7 When & Where? - Temporal-Spatial Qualities of Deviant Se- curity 148 7.1 Countermeasures Against Data Volatility & Retention...... 150 7.2 Intercultural Communication as a Countermeasure........ 157 7.3 Distribution as a Countermeasure . 168 7.4 Physical Deviant Security . 178 7.5 Interim Conclusion and Discussion . 186 iv 8 Investigative Responses Against Deviant Security 189 8.1 Security-Driven Investigations That Provide Human Security . 190 8.2 Investigations as a Public Service With Multiple Outcomes . 195 8.3 Technical Harmonization for a Global Investigation System . 202 8.4 Reactive & Proactive Investigations on Commission & Protection 208 8.5 Interim Conclusion & Discussion . 214 IV Conclusions 218 9 The Outlook of Deviant Security 219 9.1 Thesis Objectives Reiterated.................... 219 9.2 A Filled-In Deviant Security Process Cycle............ 221 9.3 Summary of Findings . 225 9.4 Moving Forward From Findings . 231 9.5 Concluding Remarks . 234 Bibliography 235 v List of Figures 1.1 A visualization of the known knowns and known unknowns of attacks and defences . .5 2.1 Security process cycle . 14 2.2 Venn-diagram of cyber security and cyber crime discourses . 18 2.3 Cyber crimes incorporated into the cyber security discourse . 19 2.4 Deviant security process cycle . 26 3.1 Security process cycles on anti-forensics . 31 3.2 Security process cycle on botnet protection . 34 3.3 Security process cycle on authorship analysis . 36 3.4 Security process cycle on attacker economics . 38 4.1 Conditional and consequential matrix . 64 5.1 Visual oversight of Chapter 5 . 76 5.2 Visualization of intangible and tangible protective assets . 98 6.1 Visual oversight of Chapter 6 . 106 6.2 Crime script analysis of cyber crime services and products . 112 6.3 Network chart of intertwined roles . 120 6.4 Visualization of dilemmas because of information asymmetries . 122 6.5 Continuum of hosting service providers . 124 6.6 Process description of deviant trust . 136 6.7 Visual comparison of trust and distrust continuums . 138 7.1 Conditional/consequential matrix with temporal-spatial concepts 149 7.2 Visual oversight of Chapter 7 . 150 7.3 Circle diagram of the reversed electronic panopticon . 154 7.4 Comparison of deviant security mechanisms between underground economies . 160 7.5 Euler-diagram of various deviant security cultures . 165 7.6 Visualization of points of attack and their relation . 171 7.7 Visualization of the Netherlands as a low-risk point of attack linkage172 7.8 Visualization of distribution as a countermeasure . 176 vi 8.1 Hierarchal Venn-diagram of public and private interests in the cyber security community .
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