Attivo Networks Inc.

Mcafee, Inc.

Vinod Kumar A Porwal

Harinath Vishwanath Ramchetty

Muthukumar Lakshmanan

Venu Vissamsetty

Srikant Vissamsetti

Srinivasan Narasimhan

Parthiv Hejmadi

Venu Vissametty

Endpoints of various domains implement forwarding modules as well as perform various production tasks. The endpoints of a domain participate in an election process by which one or more endpoints are selected to operate as honeypots. The forwarding modules of non-selected endpoints become inactive, but wake up periodically to determine whether an election process is occurring. Selected endpoints obtain configuration data from a management server. The endpoints then acquire IP addresses and implement one or more services according to the configuration data. The management server may configure the services based on a location of the selected endpoint. Traffic received by the selected endpoints is forwarded to the management server, which engages an attacker system using one or more VMs. When an endpoint moves to a different domain, it releases acquired IP addresses and attempts to participate in the election process in the different domain.

Implementing decoys in network endpoints

Endpoints in a network execute a sensor module that intercepts commands. The sensor module compares a source of commands to a sanctioned list of applications received from a management server. If the source does not match a sanctioned application and the command is a write or delete command, the command is ignored and a simulated acknowledgment is sent. If the command is a read command, deception data is returned instead. In some embodiments, certain data is protected such that commands will be ignored or modified to refer to deception data where the source is not a sanctioned application. The source may be verified to be a sanctioned application by evaluating a certificate, hash, or path of the source.

Deceiving attackers in endpoint systems

Endpoints in a computer network create connections to a deception server without sending any payload data. The connections create records of the connection on the endpoints, by which an attacker accesses the deception server. Received packets that include payload data are determined to be unauthorized. The deception server acquires IP addresses in various VLANS and provides these IP addresses to the endpoints over a secure channel. The connections from the endpoints to the deception server are not performed on the secure channel. IP addresses acquired by the deception server are not assigned to an interface. Instead, NAT is used to route packets including the IP addresses to various engagement servers. Each IP address is assigned a unique hostname in order to appear as multiple distinct servers. The deception server further generates broadcast traffic to generate other records that may be used to lure an attacker to the deception server.

Luring attackers towards deception servers

Methods, systems, and apparatus, including computer programs encoded on a computer storage medium, for collecting information of host devices. In one aspect, a method includes transmitting a plurality of information probes to the host device, including an agent probe that queries an agent installed on the host device for a unique agent identifier, monitoring for replies to the information probes from the host device during the host detection phase, ending the host detection phase in response to receiving a reply to the agent probe and that includes the unique agent identifier, resending the plurality of information probes and incrementing a repeat counter in response to not receiving a reply to the agent probe after the expiration of a time period and ending the host detection phase in response to a value of the repeat counter exceeding a maximum repeat value.

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Bengaluru, India

Vinod Kumar A Porwal