Carlos Novo

Gonçalo Xavier, Carlos Novo, Ricardo Morla

Command and Control (C2) communication is a key component of any structured cyber-attack. As such, security operations actively try to detect this type of communication in their networks. This poses a problem for legitimate pentesters that try to remain undetected, since commonly used pentesting tools, such as Metasploit, generate constant traffic patterns that are easily distinguishable from regular web traffic. In this paper we start with these identifiable patterns in Metasploit's C2 traffic and show that a machine learning-based detector is able to detect the presence of such traffic with high accuracy, even when encrypted. We then outline and implement a set of modifications to the Metasploit framework in order to decrease the detection rates of such classifier. To evaluate the performance of these modifications, we use two threat models with increasing awareness of these modifications. We look at the detection evasion performance and at the byte count and runtime overhead of the modifications. Our results show that for the second, increased-awareness threat model the framework-side traffic modifications yield a better detection avoidance rate (90%) than payload-side only modifications (50%). We also show that although the modifications use up to 3 times more TLS payload bytes than the original, the runtime does not significantly change and the total number of bytes (including TLS payload) reduces.

Tadeu Freitas, Carlos Novo, Inês Dutra et al.

Intrusion Tolerant Systems (ITSs) have become increasingly critical due to the rise of multi-domain adversaries exploiting diverse attack surfaces. ITS architectures aim to tolerate intrusions, ensuring system compromise is prevented or mitigated even with adversary presence. Existing ITS solutions often employ Risk Managers leveraging public security intelligence to adjust system defenses dynamically against emerging threats. However, these approaches rely heavily on databases like NVD and ExploitDB, which require manual analysis for newly discovered vulnerabilities. This dependency limits the system's responsiveness to rapidly evolving threats. HAL 9000, an ITS Risk Manager introduced in our prior work, addressed these challenges through machine learning. By analyzing descriptions of known vulnerabilities, HAL 9000 predicts and assesses new vulnerabilities automatically. To calculate the risk of a system, it also incorporates the Exploitability Probability Scoring system to estimate the likelihood of exploitation within 30 days, enhancing proactive defense capabilities. Despite its success, HAL 9000's reliance on NVD and ExploitDB knowledge is a limitation, considering the availability of other sources of information. This extended work introduces a custom-built scraper that continuously mines diverse threat sources, including security advisories, research forums, and real-time exploit proofs-of-concept. This significantly expands HAL 9000's intelligence base, enabling earlier detection and assessment of unverified vulnerabilities. Our evaluation demonstrates that integrating scraper-derived intelligence with HAL 9000's risk management framework substantially improves its ability to address emerging threats. This paper details the scraper's integration into the architecture, its role in providing additional information on new threats, and the effects on HAL 9000's management.