frank one
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In today's world, where privacy and security are paramount, it is crucial to have a comprehensive understanding of operational security (OPSEC) models. These models are designed to minimize risks while maintaining operational capabilities. However, to achieve this goal, it is essential to identify the adversaries that pose the most significant threat.
Threat models, also known as risk models, play a vital role in defining the adversaries that require the most attention and resources being concerned about. These models can be compared to a game of chess, where each move must be carefully considered to outmaneuver the opponent. There are several risk perspectives that can be used to design a threat model, including adversary-centric, asset-centric, and software-centric models. We can adopt these into very similar models for OPSEC plans. Each of these models have a single principal that operational security’s primary goal is to mitigate risk while maintaining operational capabilities.
Adversary-Centric OPSEC Model:
Adversary-centric OPSEC is a security strategy that focuses on identifying and mitigating the threats posed by potential attackers or adversaries. This approach involves understanding who your adversaries are, what they are capable of, and how they might target you. By doing so, you can develop a plan to defend against their attacks and protect what is important to you.
One of the advantages of an adversary-centric policy is that it is relatively easy to create and document. Most people already think in this way, and it is simple to come up with a list of potential adversaries. However, the downside of this approach is that you need to know your adversaries. In the case of the NSA "revelations," many people were shocked to learn that a nation-state had the type of capabilities that were disclosed by Snowden. Prior to this, not many were able to mitigate themselves from these types of threats because they simply didn't know or fully appreciate an adversary of this nature.
To elaborate further, imagine a darknet market owner or hidden service operator as the defender, and law enforcement as the adversary. The market owner's goal is to protect their customers' privacy and prevent law enforcement from shutting down the market, while law enforcement's goal is to infiltrate the market and gather as much evidence. In an adversary-centric OPSEC approach, the market owner would need focus on understanding law enforcement's tactics, techniques, and procedures (TTPs). They would analyze law enforcement's previous investigations, identify their vulnerabilities, and develop countermeasures to prevent them from accessing the market. This approach would allow the market owner to stay one step ahead of law enforcement and protect their customers' and vendors privacy.
However, if the market owner is not aware of law enforcement's TTPs, or does not bother to educate themselves on such matters, they may struggle to defend against their attacks. Law enforcement may be able to exploit vulnerabilities in the market and gather evidence without being detected. This is why it is crucial to have a thorough understanding of your adversaries and their capabilities.
Asset-Centric OPSEC Model:
This approach is a wise and strategic way of designing mitigations around your assets, which are the things you value the most. It is similar to the way a general would protect their most valuable resources in a battle. For instance, if your asset is your ability to privately communicate on the Internet, you must do everything in your power to ensure that no one can affect this. You must not focus on specific adversaries per se, but you must do everything in your power to protect yourself. In this approach, you may consider using Tor for all communications. You may also decide to use other technologies and security tools as well as buying services (VPN/Proxies) to layer your protection as a way of keeping yourself secure. By doing so, you are taking a proactive approach to safeguarding your assets.
One of the benefits of this method is that it is easy to explain why a measure needs to take place. If you are operating in a group, this may be an important factor. You can easily make the case that your asset needs to be secure, therefore we are taking these steps to mitigate the risk. This approach is less passive than the adversary-centric approach. You are not taking the point of view of being fearful of something happening, but you are merely performing the proactive, required procedures to keep your assets safe.
In ancient China, they used to say, "Know thy self, know thy enemy. A thousand battles, a thousand victories." This means that you must know yourself and your assets, as well as your adversaries and their tactics. By doing so, you can develop a strategy that is tailored to your specific situation. This is the essence of Asset-Centric OPSEC.
To further illustrate this concept, let me provide you with an analogy. Imagine that you are a farmer, and your most valuable asset is your crop. You must do everything in your power to protect your crop from pests, weather, and other threats. You may use pesticides, irrigation systems, and other tools to ensure that your crop is healthy and thriving. You are not focused on specific pests or weather patterns, but you are doing everything in your power to protect your crop. This is the same approach you must take when it comes to protecting your assets.
Operation-Centric OPSEC Model:
This approach, my favorite, lends itself nicely to compartmentalization if you’re managing multiple identities across multiple operations. An operation in this case could be an identitiy, a research project, an regular activitiy or whatever, that may require specific operational security measures. An operation-centreic OPSEC plan may sound recursive to you, but the gist is that your plans are focused on your specific operation, and that operation alone. The main difference between this and an asset-centric approach is that it is designed to have drastically different and compartmentalized procedures allowing for scalability without letting one operation interfere with another.
If you’ve ever taken a look at the security plans of a large, Fortune 500 company compared to that of a startup, it’s quite possible that the startup is able to implement simple, elegent, effective security plans while the Fortune 500 spends millions of dollars designing a unilateral security policy that severely inhibits the organizations operational capabilities. The reason that a small, agile startup can devise elegant OPSEC measures, is the same reason that compartmentalizing your OPSEC procedures in an operation-centric point-of-view is effective.
The other reason that I like this is because it gives you a good balance of a variety of different OPSEC approaches. You are paying attention to your operation’s assets while taking into account specific adversaries and their attacks. As you define an operation — we’ll say buying drugs on the darknet — you will be scoped down to a specific task and controlled environment. It lets you define boundaries in which your OPSEC guidelines can define situations in which your measures/countermeasures no longer protect you. This keeps risks at a minimum because you are only defending against a subset of your activities — those associated with the operation. In the example of buying illegal drugs on a darknet market, your OPSEC guidelines can state that in the case of the dark market collapse (which seems to happen regularly lately), your operation should fold and the identity should be burned. You can take into accounts adversaries such as those that own the market, and assets you’re concerned about such as keeping yourself out of jail.
I will admit, none of those listed are perfect, nor do they make up an exhaustive list. They may however give you a starting point for building an OPSEC plan for yourself.
E.D.
Threat models, also known as risk models, play a vital role in defining the adversaries that require the most attention and resources being concerned about. These models can be compared to a game of chess, where each move must be carefully considered to outmaneuver the opponent. There are several risk perspectives that can be used to design a threat model, including adversary-centric, asset-centric, and software-centric models. We can adopt these into very similar models for OPSEC plans. Each of these models have a single principal that operational security’s primary goal is to mitigate risk while maintaining operational capabilities.
Adversary-Centric OPSEC Model:
Adversary-centric OPSEC is a security strategy that focuses on identifying and mitigating the threats posed by potential attackers or adversaries. This approach involves understanding who your adversaries are, what they are capable of, and how they might target you. By doing so, you can develop a plan to defend against their attacks and protect what is important to you.
One of the advantages of an adversary-centric policy is that it is relatively easy to create and document. Most people already think in this way, and it is simple to come up with a list of potential adversaries. However, the downside of this approach is that you need to know your adversaries. In the case of the NSA "revelations," many people were shocked to learn that a nation-state had the type of capabilities that were disclosed by Snowden. Prior to this, not many were able to mitigate themselves from these types of threats because they simply didn't know or fully appreciate an adversary of this nature.
To elaborate further, imagine a darknet market owner or hidden service operator as the defender, and law enforcement as the adversary. The market owner's goal is to protect their customers' privacy and prevent law enforcement from shutting down the market, while law enforcement's goal is to infiltrate the market and gather as much evidence. In an adversary-centric OPSEC approach, the market owner would need focus on understanding law enforcement's tactics, techniques, and procedures (TTPs). They would analyze law enforcement's previous investigations, identify their vulnerabilities, and develop countermeasures to prevent them from accessing the market. This approach would allow the market owner to stay one step ahead of law enforcement and protect their customers' and vendors privacy.
However, if the market owner is not aware of law enforcement's TTPs, or does not bother to educate themselves on such matters, they may struggle to defend against their attacks. Law enforcement may be able to exploit vulnerabilities in the market and gather evidence without being detected. This is why it is crucial to have a thorough understanding of your adversaries and their capabilities.
Asset-Centric OPSEC Model:
This approach is a wise and strategic way of designing mitigations around your assets, which are the things you value the most. It is similar to the way a general would protect their most valuable resources in a battle. For instance, if your asset is your ability to privately communicate on the Internet, you must do everything in your power to ensure that no one can affect this. You must not focus on specific adversaries per se, but you must do everything in your power to protect yourself. In this approach, you may consider using Tor for all communications. You may also decide to use other technologies and security tools as well as buying services (VPN/Proxies) to layer your protection as a way of keeping yourself secure. By doing so, you are taking a proactive approach to safeguarding your assets.
One of the benefits of this method is that it is easy to explain why a measure needs to take place. If you are operating in a group, this may be an important factor. You can easily make the case that your asset needs to be secure, therefore we are taking these steps to mitigate the risk. This approach is less passive than the adversary-centric approach. You are not taking the point of view of being fearful of something happening, but you are merely performing the proactive, required procedures to keep your assets safe.
In ancient China, they used to say, "Know thy self, know thy enemy. A thousand battles, a thousand victories." This means that you must know yourself and your assets, as well as your adversaries and their tactics. By doing so, you can develop a strategy that is tailored to your specific situation. This is the essence of Asset-Centric OPSEC.
To further illustrate this concept, let me provide you with an analogy. Imagine that you are a farmer, and your most valuable asset is your crop. You must do everything in your power to protect your crop from pests, weather, and other threats. You may use pesticides, irrigation systems, and other tools to ensure that your crop is healthy and thriving. You are not focused on specific pests or weather patterns, but you are doing everything in your power to protect your crop. This is the same approach you must take when it comes to protecting your assets.
Operation-Centric OPSEC Model:
This approach, my favorite, lends itself nicely to compartmentalization if you’re managing multiple identities across multiple operations. An operation in this case could be an identitiy, a research project, an regular activitiy or whatever, that may require specific operational security measures. An operation-centreic OPSEC plan may sound recursive to you, but the gist is that your plans are focused on your specific operation, and that operation alone. The main difference between this and an asset-centric approach is that it is designed to have drastically different and compartmentalized procedures allowing for scalability without letting one operation interfere with another.
If you’ve ever taken a look at the security plans of a large, Fortune 500 company compared to that of a startup, it’s quite possible that the startup is able to implement simple, elegent, effective security plans while the Fortune 500 spends millions of dollars designing a unilateral security policy that severely inhibits the organizations operational capabilities. The reason that a small, agile startup can devise elegant OPSEC measures, is the same reason that compartmentalizing your OPSEC procedures in an operation-centric point-of-view is effective.
The other reason that I like this is because it gives you a good balance of a variety of different OPSEC approaches. You are paying attention to your operation’s assets while taking into account specific adversaries and their attacks. As you define an operation — we’ll say buying drugs on the darknet — you will be scoped down to a specific task and controlled environment. It lets you define boundaries in which your OPSEC guidelines can define situations in which your measures/countermeasures no longer protect you. This keeps risks at a minimum because you are only defending against a subset of your activities — those associated with the operation. In the example of buying illegal drugs on a darknet market, your OPSEC guidelines can state that in the case of the dark market collapse (which seems to happen regularly lately), your operation should fold and the identity should be burned. You can take into accounts adversaries such as those that own the market, and assets you’re concerned about such as keeping yourself out of jail.
I will admit, none of those listed are perfect, nor do they make up an exhaustive list. They may however give you a starting point for building an OPSEC plan for yourself.
E.D.