Locking Down Mac OS X

Architecture and Background

Jay Beale - Locking Down Mac OS X Locking Down Mac OS X Apple's OS X operating system combines BSD Unix with easy-to-use Mac operating system components. This has produced an operating system that natively runs Microsoft Office, is friendly as can be finding you people with which to chat and exchange fileshares with, and yet still runs a command line! Needless to say, it could probably use some lockdown before you want to take it to Def Con, or even to the airport, with the wireless card plugged in. The speaker has ported Bastille Linux to OS X and learned a thing or two about locking down OS X in the process.

Vulnerability Analysis

This talk will demonstrate lockdown, showing you how to harden the OS X operating system against future attack. Jay Beale is a security specialist focused on host lockdown and security audits. He is the Lead Developer of the Bastille project, which creates a hardening script for Linux, HP-UX, and Mac OS X, a member of the Honeynet Project, and a core participant in the Center for Internet Security. A frequent conference speaker and trainer, Jay speaks and trains at the Black Hat and LinuxWorld conferences, among others.

Exploitation and Demonstrations

A senior research scientist with the George Washington University Cyber Security Policy and Research Institute, Jay makes his living as a security consultant through Baltimore-based JJBSec, LLC. Jay writes the Center for Internet Security's Unix host security tool, currently in use worldwide by organizations from the Fortune 500 to the Department of Defense. He maintains the Center's Linux Security benchmark document and, as a core participant in the non-profit Center's Unix team, is working with private enterprises and US agencies to develop Unix security standards for industry and government. Aside from his CIS work, Jay has written a number of articles and book chapters on operating system security.

Remediation and Defensive Strategies

He is a columnist for Information Security Magazine and previously wrote a number of articles for SecurityPortal.com and SecurityFocus.com. He authored the Host Lockdown chapter in 'Unix Unleashed,' served as the security author for 'Red Hat Internet Server' and co-authored 'Snort 2.0 Intrusion Detection.' Jay's currently finishing the Addison Wesley book, 'Locking Down Linux.' Formerly, he served as the Security Team Director for MandrakeSoft, helping set company strategy, design security products, and pushing security into the third largest retail Linux distribution. He now works to further the goal of improving operating system security. To read Jay's past articles and learn about his past and future conference talks, take a look at his site.