Automate a browser with Selenium
Selenium automates browsers and can be used for testing and automating tasks in a browser.
Boot to single user mode and reset the root password
Single user mode in Linux allows only the root user to perform tasks. It is usually used for maintenance and troubleshooting, for example, resetting a forgotten root password, or solving file system failures.
Build a home hacker lab using SecGen
Tool
SecGen creates vulnerable virtual machines, lab environments, and hacking challenges, so students can learn security penetration testing techniques. Boxes like Metasploitable2 are always the same, this project uses Vagrant, Puppet, and Ruby to create randomly vulnerable virtual machines that can be used for learning or for hosting CTF events.
External link
Training
Complete the AWS Well-Architected security labs
AWS WAF
The AWS Well-Architected Framework describes key concepts, design principles, and architectural best practices for designing and running workloads in the cloud. Security is one element of the Well-Architected Framework. Amazon provide practical labs covering the different pillars within the Well-Architected Framework. These allow you to learn by doing, with code and documentation to help you.
Create your own operating system
Book
Follow through The little book about OS development to create your own x86 operating system. The book is designed to give enough help with the technical details while at the same time not reveal too much with samples and code excerpts.
Experiment with unicode homoglyphs
Homoglyphs or homographs are characters (letter and number) that look alike. A homoglyph attack is where a threat actor uses characters that look alike to deceive users into trusting an email or website when they should not.
Explore AppSec Map
enso.security's AppSec Map provides a quick overview of different elements of an AppSec programme and some of the offerings which can help an organisation provide each element of the programme.
Explore OSINT tools on OSINT Framework
OSINT framework focused on gathering information from free tools or resources. The intention is to help people find free OSINT resources.
Explore Python's Faker library
Faker
Faker is a Python package that generates fake data for you. Adversaries may use such tools to generate test data, for example when conducting phishing.
Explore Shodan
Shodan is the world's first search engine for Internet-connected devices. Discover how Internet intelligence can help you make better decisions.
Explore the National Vulnerability Database
The NVD is the U.S. government repository of standards based vulnerability management data represented using the Security Content Automation Protocol (SCAP). This data enables automation of vulnerability management, security measurement, and compliance. The NVD includes databases of security checklist references, security-related software flaws, misconfigurations, product names, and impact metrics.
Explore the security section of Azure's Well-Architected Framework
The Azure Well-Architected Framework is a set of guidance that helps you improve how you build and deploy your application on Microsoft's Azure cloud platform. Security is one pillar within the Well-Architected Framework.
Explore TripleCross
TripleCross is a Linux eBPF rootkit that demonstrates the offensive capabilities of the eBPF technology. It features backdoor, C2, library injection, execution hijacking, persistence and stealth capabilities.
Give TryHackMe a go
TryHackMe goes way beyond textbooks and focuses on fun interactive lessons that make you put theory into practice. You'll get an immersive learning experience with network simulations, intentionally vulnerable technology based on real world examples and more.
How could you hide a process?
Malware often tries to hide itself from other software, for example, anti-virus. How can a process hide from other processes whilst it is running?
How could you hide in a file?
Malware may hide itself or information it has gathered in files. How can this be done whilst still keeping the data accessible to the malware?
How could you hide in a network protocol?
Malware often tries to conceal its communication from other software and network devices. How can malware achieve this whilst still being able to send and receive information?
Install Commando-VM
CommandoVM is a fully customizable, Windows-based security distribution for penetration testing and red teaming.
Install dd-wrt firmware on an old router
DD-WRT is a Linux based alternative OpenSource firmware suitable for a great variety of WLAN routers and embedded systems. The main emphasis lies on providing the easiest possible handling while at the same time supporting a great number of functionalities within the framework of the respective hardware platform used.
Install Flare-VM
FLARE VM is a fully customizable, Windows-based security distribution for malware analysis, incident response, penetration testing, etc.
Install Kali linux
Kali Linux is an open-source, Debian-based Linux distribution geared towards various information security tasks, such as Penetration Testing, Security Research, Computer Forensics and Reverse Engineering.
Learn about bypassing eBPF-based Security Enforcement Tools
Form3 blog
Understand the limitations of eBPF-based tools and how adversaries may bypass them.
Learn about CVEs
Common Vulnerabilities and Exposures (CVEs) is a list of publicly disclosed computer security flaws. When someone refers to a CVE, they mean a security flaw that's been assigned a CVE ID number.
Learn about CWEs
CWE is a community-developed list of software and hardware weakness types. It serves as a common language, a measuring stick for security tools, and as a baseline for weakness identification, mitigation, and prevention efforts.
Learn about STRIDE
STRIDE is a model for identifying computer security threats developed by Praerit Garg and Loren Kohnfelder at Microsoft. It provides a mnemonic for security threats in six categories: Spoofing Tampering Repudiation Information disclosure (privacy breach or data leak) Denial of service Elevation of privilege
Learn about the MITRE ATT&CK framework
MITRE ATT&CK® is a globally-accessible knowledge base of adversary tactics and techniques based on real-world observations. The ATT&CK knowledge base is used as a foundation for the development of specific threat models and methodologies in the private sector, in government, and in the cybersecurity product and service community.
Learn about the NIST Cybersecurity Framework
NIST Cybersecurity Framework
Framework Overview
The Framework is voluntary guidance, based on existing standards, guidelines, and practices for organizations to better manage and reduce cybersecurity risk. In addition to helping organizations manage and reduce risks, it was designed to foster risk and cybersecurity management communications amongst both internal and external organizational stakeholders.
Learn Alloy
Alloy is an open source language and analyzer for software modeling. It has been used in a wide range of applications, from finding holes in security mechanisms to designing telephone switching networks.
Learn hacking skills using HackTheBox
Hack The Box is a massive, online cybersecurity training platform, allowing individuals, companies, universities and all kinds of organizations around the world to level up their hacking skills.
Learning about the DNS requests your computers are making by installing a Pi-hole on your home network
Pi hole provides network-wide ad blocking and monitoring of DNS requests. Explore the DNS requests your computers are making and consider the privacy implications of this traffic.
Learn TLA+
TLA+ is a “formal specification language”, a means of designing systems that lets you directly test those designs. Developed by the Turing award-winner Leslie Lamport, TLA+ has been endorsed by companies like AWS, Microsoft, and Crowdstrike.
Listen to the Risky Business podcast
Risky Business
Published weekly, the Risky Business podcast features news and in-depth commentary from security industry luminaries. Hosted by award-winning journalist Patrick Gray, Risky Business has become a must-listen digest for information security professionals.
MiTM network traffic
mitmproxy is a free and open source interactive HTTPS proxy. You can use it on the command line, through a web interface, or through a Python API.
Pack and unpack an executable
Many different executable packers exist. They may compress, encrypt or obfuscate the underlying binary. Malware authors may use either off-the-shelf packers or custom packers to avoid detection. One example packer is UPX, a free, portable, extendable, high-performance executable packer for several executable formats. If you've got more time, try analysing or debugging the binary.
Play around with Objective-See's macOS security tools
Objective-See is a non-profit that creates simple, effective macOS security tools. Their tools are free and open-source.
Play the Citadel Programming Lab from CyBOK
The Citadel Programming Lab is an online virtual secure coding game-based computer lab. The Lab combines a tower defence game with 6 security programming tasks. The lab is based on a serious game approach to join learning and playfulness. The lab’s platform combines a Unity game linked with a coding environment based on an instance of GitLab. The game elements and coding exercises are linked to CyBOK, the Cybersecurity Body of Knowledge, to map its cybersecurity content.
Play the Elevation of Privilege game
Elevation of Privilege (EoP) is the easy way to get started threat modeling. It is a card game that developers, architects or security experts can play.
Read about a NIST cyber security standard e.g. 800-53
NIST Special Publication 800-53 provides a catalog of security and privacy controls. It is published by the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST). NIST develops and issues standards, guidelines, and other publications.
Read about browser extension security
Browser extensions have privileged access within your browser. Learn about how browser extensions work and their attack surface.
Read about building a product security programme from scratch
Read about one person's experience creating product security programme's from scratch.
Read about Cyber Physical systems
Cyber-Physical Systems (CPSs) are engineered systems that are built from, and depend upon, the seamless integration of computation, and physical components. Examples include the power grid, transportation systems, autonomous vehicles, robotics, and medical implantable devices.
Read an NCSC guidance document
The UK's National Cyber Security Centre (NCSC) publish guidance and reports across a wide range of topics. Reading one of these guides will give you insight into the challenges faced in the real world.
Read a penetration test report
A penetration test is an authorized simulated cyberattack on a computer system, performed to evaluate the security of the system. The findings are usually documented in penetration test report which organisations use to fix issues and improve their internal vulnerability assessment and management processes.
Read a Project Zero write up
Project Zero is a team of security analysts employed by Google tasked with finding zero-day vulnerabilities. They provide comprehensive write-ups of the vulnerabilities they discover, and their work to work with the wide community to remediate them.
Read a VUSec publication
VUSec is the Systems and Network Security Group at Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam. Their research covers all aspects of system-level security and reliability, including topics such as software hardening, exploitation, binary analysis, dependable systems, software testing, side channels, and reverse engineering.
Read Cloudflare's roadmap to a zero trust architecture
A zero trust architecture is an approach to system design where inherent trust in the network is removed. Instead, the network is assumed hostile and each access request is verified, based on an access policy.
Read Crafting Interpreters
Crafting Interpreters contains everything you need to implement a full-featured, efficient scripting language. You’ll learn both high-level concepts around parsing and semantics and gritty details like bytecode representation and garbage collection. Your brain will light up with new ideas, and your hands will get dirty and calloused. It’s a blast. Starting from main(), you build a language that features rich syntax, dynamic typing, garbage collection, lexical scope, first-class functions, closures, classes, and inheritance. All packed into a few thousand lines of clean, fast code that you thoroughly understand because you write each one yourself.
Read PagerDuty's 'Security Training for Everyone'
This is an open-source version of "Security Training for Everyone", PagerDuty's internal employee security training, given to all PagerDuty employees as part of our annual security training program. The main topics covered in this training are: Social Engineering - Primarily phishing and how to detect and report such attacks. Passwords - A crash course in how passwords are cracked, and why it’s important to have strong passwords. Physical Security - Guidelines for maintaining the security of our offices and equipment. Data Handling - The different types of data we have and how to properly handle that data. Compliance - How compliance affects our day-to-day operations.
Read SystemDesign.org’s Textbook for System Design Interviews
Understanding how other systems are designed can help us to spot weaknesses and improve the security of our own designs.
Read The Art of Mac Malware
The "Art of Mac Malware" was created to provide a comprehensive resource about threats targeting Apple's desktop OS. Dedicated to the community, it is a culmination of over a decade of macOS security research.
Read the Computer Misuse Act
CPS Guidance
The Computer Misuse Act 1990 attempts to discourage people from using computers for illegal purposes. Also consider reading the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) guidance.
Read the CWE Most Important Hardware Weaknesses
The CWE™ Most Important Hardware Weaknesses is the result of collaboration within the Hardware CWE Special Interest Group (SIG). Its intent is to drive awareness of common hardware weaknesses and prevent hardware security issues at the source by educating designers and programmers on how to eliminate important mistakes early in the product development lifecycle.
Read the CyBOK Adversarial Behaviours Knowledge Area introduction
The Cyber Security Body Of Knowledge is a comprehensive Body of Knowledge to inform and underpin education and professional training for the cyber security sector. The CyBOK project aims to bring cyber security into line with the more established sciences by distilling knowledge from major internationally-recognised experts to form a Cyber Security Body of Knowledge that will provide much-needed foundations for this emerging topic. The project, funded by the National Cyber Security Programme, is led by the University of Bristol's Professor Awais Rashid, along with other leading cyber security experts - including Professor Andrew Martin, Professor Steve Schneider, Dr Yulia Cherdantseva, Dr Rod Chapman and Dr Marina Krotofil.
Read the CyBOK Applied Cryptography Knowledge Area introduction
The Cyber Security Body Of Knowledge is a comprehensive Body of Knowledge to inform and underpin education and professional training for the cyber security sector. The CyBOK project aims to bring cyber security into line with the more established sciences by distilling knowledge from major internationally-recognised experts to form a Cyber Security Body of Knowledge that will provide much-needed foundations for this emerging topic. The project, funded by the National Cyber Security Programme, is led by the University of Bristol's Professor Awais Rashid, along with other leading cyber security experts - including Professor Andrew Martin, Professor Steve Schneider, Dr Yulia Cherdantseva, Dr Rod Chapman and Dr Marina Krotofil.
Read the CyBOK Authentication, Authorisation & Accountability Knowledge Area introduction
The Cyber Security Body Of Knowledge is a comprehensive Body of Knowledge to inform and underpin education and professional training for the cyber security sector. The CyBOK project aims to bring cyber security into line with the more established sciences by distilling knowledge from major internationally-recognised experts to form a Cyber Security Body of Knowledge that will provide much-needed foundations for this emerging topic. The project, funded by the National Cyber Security Programme, is led by the University of Bristol's Professor Awais Rashid, along with other leading cyber security experts - including Professor Andrew Martin, Professor Steve Schneider, Dr Yulia Cherdantseva, Dr Rod Chapman and Dr Marina Krotofil.
Read the CyBOK Cryptography Knowledge Area introduction
The Cyber Security Body Of Knowledge is a comprehensive Body of Knowledge to inform and underpin education and professional training for the cyber security sector. The CyBOK project aims to bring cyber security into line with the more established sciences by distilling knowledge from major internationally-recognised experts to form a Cyber Security Body of Knowledge that will provide much-needed foundations for this emerging topic. The project, funded by the National Cyber Security Programme, is led by the University of Bristol's Professor Awais Rashid, along with other leading cyber security experts - including Professor Andrew Martin, Professor Steve Schneider, Dr Yulia Cherdantseva, Dr Rod Chapman and Dr Marina Krotofil.
Read the CyBOK Cyber Physical Systems Knowledge Area introduction
The Cyber Security Body Of Knowledge is a comprehensive Body of Knowledge to inform and underpin education and professional training for the cyber security sector. The CyBOK project aims to bring cyber security into line with the more established sciences by distilling knowledge from major internationally-recognised experts to form a Cyber Security Body of Knowledge that will provide much-needed foundations for this emerging topic. The project, funded by the National Cyber Security Programme, is led by the University of Bristol's Professor Awais Rashid, along with other leading cyber security experts - including Professor Andrew Martin, Professor Steve Schneider, Dr Yulia Cherdantseva, Dr Rod Chapman and Dr Marina Krotofil.
Read the CyBOK Distributed Systems Security Knowledge Area introduction
The Cyber Security Body Of Knowledge is a comprehensive Body of Knowledge to inform and underpin education and professional training for the cyber security sector. The CyBOK project aims to bring cyber security into line with the more established sciences by distilling knowledge from major internationally-recognised experts to form a Cyber Security Body of Knowledge that will provide much-needed foundations for this emerging topic. The project, funded by the National Cyber Security Programme, is led by the University of Bristol's Professor Awais Rashid, along with other leading cyber security experts - including Professor Andrew Martin, Professor Steve Schneider, Dr Yulia Cherdantseva, Dr Rod Chapman and Dr Marina Krotofil.
Read the CyBOK Forensics Knowledge Area introduction
The Cyber Security Body Of Knowledge is a comprehensive Body of Knowledge to inform and underpin education and professional training for the cyber security sector. The CyBOK project aims to bring cyber security into line with the more established sciences by distilling knowledge from major internationally-recognised experts to form a Cyber Security Body of Knowledge that will provide much-needed foundations for this emerging topic. The project, funded by the National Cyber Security Programme, is led by the University of Bristol's Professor Awais Rashid, along with other leading cyber security experts - including Professor Andrew Martin, Professor Steve Schneider, Dr Yulia Cherdantseva, Dr Rod Chapman and Dr Marina Krotofil.
Read the CyBOK Formal Methods for Security Knowledge Area introduction
The Cyber Security Body Of Knowledge is a comprehensive Body of Knowledge to inform and underpin education and professional training for the cyber security sector. The CyBOK project aims to bring cyber security into line with the more established sciences by distilling knowledge from major internationally-recognised experts to form a Cyber Security Body of Knowledge that will provide much-needed foundations for this emerging topic. The project, funded by the National Cyber Security Programme, is led by the University of Bristol's Professor Awais Rashid, along with other leading cyber security experts - including Professor Andrew Martin, Professor Steve Schneider, Dr Yulia Cherdantseva, Dr Rod Chapman and Dr Marina Krotofil.
Read the CyBOK Hardware Security Knowledge Area introduction
The Cyber Security Body Of Knowledge is a comprehensive Body of Knowledge to inform and underpin education and professional training for the cyber security sector. The CyBOK project aims to bring cyber security into line with the more established sciences by distilling knowledge from major internationally-recognised experts to form a Cyber Security Body of Knowledge that will provide much-needed foundations for this emerging topic. The project, funded by the National Cyber Security Programme, is led by the University of Bristol's Professor Awais Rashid, along with other leading cyber security experts - including Professor Andrew Martin, Professor Steve Schneider, Dr Yulia Cherdantseva, Dr Rod Chapman and Dr Marina Krotofil.
Read the CyBOK Human Factors Knowledge Area introduction
The Cyber Security Body Of Knowledge is a comprehensive Body of Knowledge to inform and underpin education and professional training for the cyber security sector. The CyBOK project aims to bring cyber security into line with the more established sciences by distilling knowledge from major internationally-recognised experts to form a Cyber Security Body of Knowledge that will provide much-needed foundations for this emerging topic. The project, funded by the National Cyber Security Programme, is led by the University of Bristol's Professor Awais Rashid, along with other leading cyber security experts - including Professor Andrew Martin, Professor Steve Schneider, Dr Yulia Cherdantseva, Dr Rod Chapman and Dr Marina Krotofil.
Read the CyBOK Introduction
The Cyber Security Body Of Knowledge is a comprehensive Body of Knowledge to inform and underpin education and professional training for the cyber security sector. The CyBOK project aims to bring cyber security into line with the more established sciences by distilling knowledge from major internationally-recognised experts to form a Cyber Security Body of Knowledge that will provide much-needed foundations for this emerging topic. The project, funded by the National Cyber Security Programme, is led by the University of Bristol's Professor Awais Rashid, along with other leading cyber security experts - including Professor Andrew Martin, Professor Steve Schneider, Dr Yulia Cherdantseva, Dr Rod Chapman and Dr Marina Krotofil.
Read the CyBOK Law & Regulation Knowledge Area introduction
The Cyber Security Body Of Knowledge is a comprehensive Body of Knowledge to inform and underpin education and professional training for the cyber security sector. The CyBOK project aims to bring cyber security into line with the more established sciences by distilling knowledge from major internationally-recognised experts to form a Cyber Security Body of Knowledge that will provide much-needed foundations for this emerging topic. The project, funded by the National Cyber Security Programme, is led by the University of Bristol's Professor Awais Rashid, along with other leading cyber security experts - including Professor Andrew Martin, Professor Steve Schneider, Dr Yulia Cherdantseva, Dr Rod Chapman and Dr Marina Krotofil.
Read the CyBOK Malware & Attack Technologies Knowledge Area introduction
The Cyber Security Body Of Knowledge is a comprehensive Body of Knowledge to inform and underpin education and professional training for the cyber security sector. The CyBOK project aims to bring cyber security into line with the more established sciences by distilling knowledge from major internationally-recognised experts to form a Cyber Security Body of Knowledge that will provide much-needed foundations for this emerging topic. The project, funded by the National Cyber Security Programme, is led by the University of Bristol's Professor Awais Rashid, along with other leading cyber security experts - including Professor Andrew Martin, Professor Steve Schneider, Dr Yulia Cherdantseva, Dr Rod Chapman and Dr Marina Krotofil.
Read the CyBOK Network Security Knowledge Area introduction
The Cyber Security Body Of Knowledge is a comprehensive Body of Knowledge to inform and underpin education and professional training for the cyber security sector. The CyBOK project aims to bring cyber security into line with the more established sciences by distilling knowledge from major internationally-recognised experts to form a Cyber Security Body of Knowledge that will provide much-needed foundations for this emerging topic. The project, funded by the National Cyber Security Programme, is led by the University of Bristol's Professor Awais Rashid, along with other leading cyber security experts - including Professor Andrew Martin, Professor Steve Schneider, Dr Yulia Cherdantseva, Dr Rod Chapman and Dr Marina Krotofil.
Read the CyBOK Operating Systems & Virtualisation Security Knowledge Area introduction
The Cyber Security Body Of Knowledge is a comprehensive Body of Knowledge to inform and underpin education and professional training for the cyber security sector. The CyBOK project aims to bring cyber security into line with the more established sciences by distilling knowledge from major internationally-recognised experts to form a Cyber Security Body of Knowledge that will provide much-needed foundations for this emerging topic. The project, funded by the National Cyber Security Programme, is led by the University of Bristol's Professor Awais Rashid, along with other leading cyber security experts - including Professor Andrew Martin, Professor Steve Schneider, Dr Yulia Cherdantseva, Dr Rod Chapman and Dr Marina Krotofil.
Read the CyBOK Physical Layer and Telecommunications Security Knowledge Area introduction
The Cyber Security Body Of Knowledge is a comprehensive Body of Knowledge to inform and underpin education and professional training for the cyber security sector. The CyBOK project aims to bring cyber security into line with the more established sciences by distilling knowledge from major internationally-recognised experts to form a Cyber Security Body of Knowledge that will provide much-needed foundations for this emerging topic. The project, funded by the National Cyber Security Programme, is led by the University of Bristol's Professor Awais Rashid, along with other leading cyber security experts - including Professor Andrew Martin, Professor Steve Schneider, Dr Yulia Cherdantseva, Dr Rod Chapman and Dr Marina Krotofil.
Read the CyBOK Privacy & Online Rights Knowledge Area introduction
The Cyber Security Body Of Knowledge is a comprehensive Body of Knowledge to inform and underpin education and professional training for the cyber security sector. The CyBOK project aims to bring cyber security into line with the more established sciences by distilling knowledge from major internationally-recognised experts to form a Cyber Security Body of Knowledge that will provide much-needed foundations for this emerging topic. The project, funded by the National Cyber Security Programme, is led by the University of Bristol's Professor Awais Rashid, along with other leading cyber security experts - including Professor Andrew Martin, Professor Steve Schneider, Dr Yulia Cherdantseva, Dr Rod Chapman and Dr Marina Krotofil.
Read the CyBOK Risk Management & Governance Knowledge Area introduction
The Cyber Security Body Of Knowledge is a comprehensive Body of Knowledge to inform and underpin education and professional training for the cyber security sector. The CyBOK project aims to bring cyber security into line with the more established sciences by distilling knowledge from major internationally-recognised experts to form a Cyber Security Body of Knowledge that will provide much-needed foundations for this emerging topic. The project, funded by the National Cyber Security Programme, is led by the University of Bristol's Professor Awais Rashid, along with other leading cyber security experts - including Professor Andrew Martin, Professor Steve Schneider, Dr Yulia Cherdantseva, Dr Rod Chapman and Dr Marina Krotofil.
Read the CyBOK Secure Software Lifecycle Knowledge Area introduction
The Cyber Security Body Of Knowledge is a comprehensive Body of Knowledge to inform and underpin education and professional training for the cyber security sector. The CyBOK project aims to bring cyber security into line with the more established sciences by distilling knowledge from major internationally-recognised experts to form a Cyber Security Body of Knowledge that will provide much-needed foundations for this emerging topic. The project, funded by the National Cyber Security Programme, is led by the University of Bristol's Professor Awais Rashid, along with other leading cyber security experts - including Professor Andrew Martin, Professor Steve Schneider, Dr Yulia Cherdantseva, Dr Rod Chapman and Dr Marina Krotofil.
Read the CyBOK Security Operations & Incident Management Knowledge Area introduction
The Cyber Security Body Of Knowledge is a comprehensive Body of Knowledge to inform and underpin education and professional training for the cyber security sector. The CyBOK project aims to bring cyber security into line with the more established sciences by distilling knowledge from major internationally-recognised experts to form a Cyber Security Body of Knowledge that will provide much-needed foundations for this emerging topic. The project, funded by the National Cyber Security Programme, is led by the University of Bristol's Professor Awais Rashid, along with other leading cyber security experts - including Professor Andrew Martin, Professor Steve Schneider, Dr Yulia Cherdantseva, Dr Rod Chapman and Dr Marina Krotofil.
Read the CyBOK Software Security Knowledge Area introduction
The Cyber Security Body Of Knowledge is a comprehensive Body of Knowledge to inform and underpin education and professional training for the cyber security sector. The CyBOK project aims to bring cyber security into line with the more established sciences by distilling knowledge from major internationally-recognised experts to form a Cyber Security Body of Knowledge that will provide much-needed foundations for this emerging topic. The project, funded by the National Cyber Security Programme, is led by the University of Bristol's Professor Awais Rashid, along with other leading cyber security experts - including Professor Andrew Martin, Professor Steve Schneider, Dr Yulia Cherdantseva, Dr Rod Chapman and Dr Marina Krotofil.
Read the CyBOK Web & Mobile Security Knowledge Area introduction
The Cyber Security Body Of Knowledge is a comprehensive Body of Knowledge to inform and underpin education and professional training for the cyber security sector. The CyBOK project aims to bring cyber security into line with the more established sciences by distilling knowledge from major internationally-recognised experts to form a Cyber Security Body of Knowledge that will provide much-needed foundations for this emerging topic. The project, funded by the National Cyber Security Programme, is led by the University of Bristol's Professor Awais Rashid, along with other leading cyber security experts - including Professor Andrew Martin, Professor Steve Schneider, Dr Yulia Cherdantseva, Dr Rod Chapman and Dr Marina Krotofil.
Read the Engagement Process booklet in the Practising Creative Securities series
Practising Creative Securities is a series of books which outline engagement practices and methods that can be used to structure conversations about digital security in day-to-day situations. These engagement practices and methods have been developed from eight years of research spanning four research projects that have focused on encouraging communities to talk about what digital security means to them in their day-to-day lives.
Read the Everyday Security booklet in the Practising Creative Securities series
Practising Creative Securities is a series of books which outline engagement practices and methods that can be used to structure conversations about digital security in day-to-day situations. These engagement practices and methods have been developed from eight years of research spanning four research projects that have focused on encouraging communities to talk about what digital security means to them in their day-to-day lives.
Read the Introduction booklet in the Practising Creative Securities series
Practising Creative Securities is a series of books which outline engagement practices and methods that can be used to structure conversations about digital security in day-to-day situations. These engagement practices and methods have been developed from eight years of research spanning four research projects that have focused on encouraging communities to talk about what digital security means to them in their day-to-day lives.
Read the OWASP Application Security Verification Standard (ASVS)
The OWASP Application Security Verification Standard (ASVS) Project provides a basis for testing web application technical security controls and also provides developers with a list of requirements for secure development. The primary aim of the OWASP Application Security Verification Standard (ASVS) Project is to normalize the range in the coverage and level of rigor available in the market when it comes to performing Web application security verification using a commercially-workable open standard. The standard provides a basis for testing application technical security controls, as well as any technical security controls in the environment, that are relied on to protect against vulnerabilities such as Cross-Site Scripting (XSS) and SQL injection. This standard can be used to establish a level of confidence in the security of Web applications.
Read the OWASP Top 10
The OWASP Top 10 is a standard awareness document for developers and web application security. It represents a broad consensus about the most critical security risks to web applications.
Read the SANS New to Cyber Field Manual
This guide was created to help YOU figure out the best path to get into cybersecurity. Use it to help develop your skills and find a network of people to support you getting into the industry.
Setup a continuous integration (CI) build
Continuous integration (CI) is automatically integrating and building code changes from multiple contributors into a single software build. For example, a build may be produced every time a developer pushes code to a source control repository.
Setup a web service behind an nginx reverse proxy
nginx [engine x] is an HTTP and reverse proxy server, a mail proxy server, and a generic TCP/UDP proxy server, originally written by Igor Sysoev. A reverse proxy is a server that sits in front of web servers and forwards client (e.g. web browser) requests to those web servers.
Setup dependabot on a GitHub project
Dependabot provides automated dependency updates. It is built into GitHub and makes keeping your dependencies up to date quick and easy.
Try an online OSINT tutorial
Open-Source Intelligence (OSINT) is the collection and analysis of data gathered from open sources to produce intelligence.
Try Burp Suite in your homelab
Burp Suite enables its users to accelerate application security testing.
Try out bWAPP
bWAPP, or a buggy web application, is a free and open source deliberately insecure web application. It helps security enthusiasts, developers and students to discover and to prevent web vulnerabilities. bWAPP prepares one to conduct successful penetration testing and ethical hacking projects. What makes bWAPP so unique? Well, it has over 100 web vulnerabilities! It covers all major known web bugs, including all risks from the OWASP Top 10 project. bWAPP is a PHP application that uses a MySQL database. It can be hosted on Linux/Windows with Apache/IIS and MySQL. It can also be installed with WAMP or XAMPP. Another possibility is to download the bee-box, a custom Linux VM pre-installed with bWAPP.
Try out OWASP Mutillidae II
OWASP Mutillidae II is a free, open-source, deliberately vulnerable web application providing a target for web-security training. With dozens of vulnerabilities and hints to help the user; this is an easy-to-use web hacking environment designed for labs, security enthusiast, classrooms, CTF, and vulnerability assessment tool targets.
Try The Backdoor Factory (BDF)
The goal of BDF is to patch executable binaries with user desired shellcode and continue normal execution of the prepatched state.
Try using Kismet
Kismet is a wireless network and device detector, sniffer, wardriving tool, and WIDS (wireless intrusion detection) framework.
Try using Tetragon
Tetragon is a runtime security enforcement and observability tool. Tetragon applies policy and filtering directly in eBPF in the kernel.
Try using the Capstone disassembler
Capstone is a lightweight multi-platform, multi-architecture disassembly framework.
Try using the Evil-Twin Framework
EvilTwinFramework is a framework for pentesters that facilitates evil twin attacks as well as exploiting other WiFi vulnerabilities.
Try using the Keystone assembler
Keystone is a lightweight multi-platform, multi-architecture assembler framework.
Try using the PiRogue tool suite
PiRogue tool suite (PTS) is an open-source tool suite that provides a comprehensive mobile forensic and network traffic analysis platform targeting mobile devices both Android and iOS, internet of things devices (devices that are connected to the user mobile apps), and in general any device using wi-fi to connect to the Internet.
Try using the Unicorn emulator
Unicorn is a lightweight multi-platform, multi-architecture CPU emulator framework.
Try using tshark
TShark is a command line network protocol analyzer. It lets you capture packet data from a live network, or read packets from a previously saved capture file, either printing a decoded form of those packets to the standard output or writing the packets to a file. TShark's native capture file format is pcapng format, which is also the format used by Wireshark and various other tools.
Try vim
Vim is a highly configurable text editor built to make creating and changing any kind of text very efficient. It is included as "vi" with most UNIX systems and with Apple OS X. It's widespread availability on UNIX systems means that it's worth knowing how to use it. Sometimes, it is all you'll have available.
Try web scraping using scrapy
Scrapy is an open source and collaborative framework for extracting the data you need from websites. In a fast, simple, yet extensible way.
Understand the OSI network model
The Open Systems Interconnection model (OSI model) is a model of the communication functions of a telecommunication system or computing system.
Use a password manager
A password manager (or a web browser) can store all your passwords securely, so you don’t have to worry about remembering them. This allows you to use unique, strong passwords for all your important accounts (rather than using the same password for all of them, which you should never do).
Use Archi to draw a system diagram
Archi is the Open Source modelling toolkit for creating ArchiMate models and sketches. Used by Enterprise Architects everywhere.
Use Autopsy to analyse a disk image
Autopsy® is an easy to use, GUI-based program that allows you to efficiently analyze hard drives and smart phones. It has a plug-in architecture that allows you to find add-on modules or develop custom modules in Java or Python.
Use Cairis to create personas and model data flow
CAIRIS stands for Computer Aided Integration of Requirements and Information Security. It is an open source platform for eliciting, specifying, and validating secure and usable systems. It was built from the ground up to support all the elements necessary for usability, requirements, and risk analysis.
Use CyberChef to base64 encode and decode data
CyberChef is a simple, intuitive web app for carrying out all manner of "cyber" operations within a web browser. These operations include simple encoding like XOR and Base64, more complex encryption like AES, DES and Blowfish, creating binary and hexdumps, compression and decompression of data, calculating hashes and checksums, IPv6 and X.509 parsing, changing character encodings, and much more. The tool is designed to enable both technical and non-technical analysts to manipulate data in complex ways without having to deal with complex tools or algorithms. It was conceived, designed, built and incrementally improved by an analyst in their 10% innovation time over several years.
Use CyberChef to ROT-13 data
CyberChef is a simple, intuitive web app for carrying out all manner of "cyber" operations within a web browser. These operations include simple encoding like XOR and Base64, more complex encryption like AES, DES and Blowfish, creating binary and hexdumps, compression and decompression of data, calculating hashes and checksums, IPv6 and X.509 parsing, changing character encodings, and much more. The tool is designed to enable both technical and non-technical analysts to manipulate data in complex ways without having to deal with complex tools or algorithms. It was conceived, designed, built and incrementally improved by an analyst in their 10% innovation time over several years.
Use CyberChef to XOR data
CyberChef is a simple, intuitive web app for carrying out all manner of "cyber" operations within a web browser. These operations include simple encoding like XOR and Base64, more complex encryption like AES, DES and Blowfish, creating binary and hexdumps, compression and decompression of data, calculating hashes and checksums, IPv6 and X.509 parsing, changing character encodings, and much more. The tool is designed to enable both technical and non-technical analysts to manipulate data in complex ways without having to deal with complex tools or algorithms. It was conceived, designed, built and incrementally improved by an analyst in their 10% innovation time over several years.
Use Diceware to general a password
Diceware uses rolls of a dice and a word list to help you create a new, secure, passphrase.
Use dig to explore the responses from different DNS servers
dig (domain information groper) is a flexible tool for interrogating DNS name servers. It performs DNS lookups and displays the answers that are returned from the name server(s) that were queried. Most DNS administrators use dig to troubleshoot DNS problems because of its flexibility, ease of use and clarity of output. Other lookup tools tend to have less functionality than dig.
Use foremost for file carving
Foremost is a forensic data recovery program for Linux used to recover files using their headers, footers, and data structures through a process known as file carving.
Use Frida
Frida is a dynamic instrumentation toolkit for developers, reverse-engineers, and security researchers. Inject your own scripts into black box processes. Hook any function, spy on crypto APIs or trace private application code, no source code needed. Edit, hit save, and instantly see the results. All without compilation steps or program restarts.
Use jq to filter JSON on the command line
jq is a lightweight and flexible command-line JSON processor.
Use Metapsloit to compromise a virtual machine
Metasploit is the world’s most used penetration testing framework.
Use radare2
A free/libre toolchain for easing several low level tasks like forensics, software reverse engineering, exploiting, debugging etc.
Use sqlmap
sqlmap is an open source penetration testing tool that automates the process of detecting and exploiting SQL injection flaws and taking over of database servers. It comes with a powerful detection engine, many niche features for the ultimate penetration tester and a broad range of switches lasting from database fingerprinting, over data fetching from the database, to accessing the underlying file system and executing commands on the operating system via out-of-band connections.
Use volatility to perform memory forensics
The Volatility Framework is an open source memory forensics suite written in Python.
Use Wireshark to analyse network traffic
Wireshark is the world’s foremost and widely-used network protocol analyzer. It lets you see what’s happening on your network at a microscopic level and is the de facto (and often de jure) standard across many commercial and non-profit enterprises, government agencies, and educational institutions.
Watch Maddie Stone's talk, Bad Binder: Finding an Android In The Wild 0day
Maddie Stone is a security researcher on Google Project Zero.
ACCU website
Watch Professor Lizzie Coles-Kemp talk about "Digital security for all: why an inclusive security approach matters"
Professor Lizzie Coles-Kemp from the Information Security Group at Royal Holloway University delivered an inaugural lecture titled 'Digital security for all: why an inclusive security approach matters'. at Royal Holloway on 11th October 2018. Professor Coles-Kemp argued that that engaging with the protection of digital technology from the viewpoint of the security of people and society creates a more inclusive approach to digital security and a digital security paradigm for everyone. Connecting digital security to a rich history of security theory, she sets out alternative ways of conceptualising digital security and explore what we can learn from such conceptualisations.
Work through the pwn.college labs
pwn.college is an education platform for students (and other interested parties) to learn about, and practice, core cybersecurity concepts in a hands-on fashion.
Write a CMakelists.txt to build a simple binary using CMake
CMake is an open-source, cross-platform family of tools designed to build, test and package software. CMake is used to control the software compilation process using simple platform and compiler independent configuration files, and generate native makefiles and workspaces that can be used in the compiler environment of your choice.
Write a daemon process on Linux
A daemon is a service process that runs in the background and supervises the system or provides functionality to other processes.
Write an URL shortener
URL shorteners transform long URLs into short ones. They respond to an HTTP request for a short URL with a redirect to another. Try generating URLs composed of three or four easy to remember words.
Write a script using The Sleuth Kit (TSK) to analyse a disk image
The Sleuth Kit® is a collection of command line tools and a C library that allows you to analyze disk images and recover files from them. It is used behind the scenes in Autopsy and many other open source and commercial forensics tools.