DEFCON 21- Registration Day

August 1st at 12:00am

I've had a busy day- I just got back from his first day at DEF CON 21! Things were getting warmed up today and I look forward to the rest of the conference.

This is my first DEF CON, so I'm learning the ropes as I go along.

Summary of my First Day at DEF CON 21:

  • Registration started at 8am in the Rotunda at the Rio Hotel and Casino in Las Vegas
    • I arrived at 8:03am and found that the line had extended down a couple of hallways and out the door by the pool. While it took more than 90 minutes to get registered I was pleased that they had enough conference badges for everyone. :)

  • Hacker Law School class started at 10am
    • They covered Intellectual Property (Including Fair Use, The DMCA and Patents), Criminal Law (Computer Fraud and Abuse Act), and Criminal Procedure (What happens when you get arrested, arraigned and tried in court).

      I found the presentation to be excellent. While I knew a lot about the Intellectual Property side of things I learned a few specifics about copyright 'rights' that can be assigned along with the criminal process (I've never been arrested, so it was news to me.

  • Pentesters Toolkit presentation started at 12:00pm
    • The presenter gave a high-level presentation of some tools he likes to take with him when he goes penetration testing. A few things that stick out to me:
      • Know your audience (Dress appropriately, carry equipment in a suitable bag to make an impression)
      • Know your target. PACK ACCORDINGLY.
      • Understand your tools, don't just be 'point and click'. This way when problems come up you can actually solve them. If your tools are magic black boxes you may not know the incantation needed to get things working again if they stop.
      • To get started with Penetration testing, try learning about Securing and Defending networks.
      • Typically the largest issues in a penetration test are Patch Management and Configuration related
      • TSA Security theater. Apparently you can get some stuff 'out' that you can't get back. Go figure- TSA Security theater isn't too effective.

  • <Break from 1 to 2pm for lunch>

  • Meet Pentoo (Linux Pen testing distribution) at 2:00pm
    • pentoo.ch is the home of pentoo
    • It is based on the Gentoo distribution of Linux (one of my personal favorites)
    • Goals: Fully open development, hardened kernel, hardened toolchain, best tools available
    • The distro gets updated regularly, although the ISO releases are a bit slow

      My thoughts: I'll be trying out this distro!

  • Wireless Penetration Testing 101 & Wireless Contesting at 3:00pm
    • Website: defcon-wireless-village.com
    • I found this presentation to be MUCH more in-depth than the 'pentesters toolkit' one. Well done!
    • They have a few suggestions for the budding Penetration tester:
      • Have a repeatable, reproducible process that you can use when at customer locations
      • Understand what the Rules of Engagement are that the customers have set
      • Gather info like (SSIDs, ESSIDs, MACs, Encrption modes, etc...)
      • Understand your target, do whatever passive recon you can
      • When working in a crowded wifi space, be careful (when you can detect over 600 APs, you have to target where you interfere)
      • Prepare a readable report that isn't just a re-badged Qualys report! This gets you customers. :)
      • Practice, Practice, Practice! You need to know your craft to effectively perform your job
      • Know your equipment, try not to allow equipment failure while out
    • Also, a few suggestions for things you need:
      • Pick between 1, 2 and 3 Wifi card setups (Depending on injection needs)
      • Get a good antenna (pick appropriate type: omnidirectional or directional)
      • Get good wireless cards with good chipsets:
        • Atheros
        • RaLink
        • RealTek
        • Centrino

          Good card to buy: Alpha (b), (g) or (n) - only about $25 (maybe?)

      • Some good software:
        • AircrackNG - CLI
        • Airdrop - CLI (Sounds cool!)
        • Airgraph - CLI (Produces graphs that scare executives)
        • KismetNG - CLI
        • Cian and Able - GUI
        • GisKismet - GUI
        • Wireshark - GUI (Vulnerability out, get patch before using)
        • KisMac - GUI for OS X

 

Remarks

It kind of felt like a slow day. While there was some interesting information presented, I think the 'best stuff' is yet to come. With Black Hat finishing up today it seems like they would want to save things for when more people can attend.

I must say that some of the sessions I attended were PACKED. If there are going to be any more people Friday -> Sunday it may be standing room only for some presentations.

The badge this year comes in the form of a PCB cut-out Playing card. Non-electronic in nature, but looks cool and apparently has a code that could be cracked if people interact with one another.

Looking forward for the rest of the conference!