The Assessment (Threat Community B – Initech Novelty, Inc.)
There is some duplicate information from part 2 at the beginning of this assessment to aid some readers who may have landed on this page with out reading Part 1 or Part 2.
In part two of “Hidden Field / Sensitive Information” we assessed the risk for “Threat Community” A – Malware. The FAIR assessment resulted in a risk rating of MEDIUM. As mentioned in Part 2 – there is another Threat Community we need to address and that is Initech Novelty Inc. (INI) itself. Because INI is a PCI merchant and is accountable for the security of its applications that process payment card information, the vulnerability that has been identified and confirmed – in the eyes of the Security Manager – makes INI non-compliant with PCI-DSS. I am assuming the INI is going to declare / update this in their SAQ.
Note: For the “Hidden Field / Sensitive Information” Assessment, I am choosing to perform two assessments; one for each threat community. Usually, I would choose the most likely TCOMM and focus on that, but because there are PCI compliance implications with this scenario – it is appropriate to address that as well.
1. Identify the Asset(s) at Risk: (Page 3 of the FAIR Basic Risk Assessment Guide; aka BRAG)
a. Consumer payment card information. Specifically, the payment card primary account number (PAN) and CVV2/CID/CVC2 values, expiration dates, and cardholder name information.
b. The state of Initech Novelty Inc. PCI Compliance.
2. Identify the “Threat Community” (TCOMM); (Page 3 of the FAIR BRAG): There are multiple threat communities that pose a threat to the assets described above. For this scenario, the first two communities that come to mind are zero-day malware and Initech Novelty Inc. itself.
a. Zero-Day Malware. I am choosing this TCOMM for the assessment for several reasons. Most of the INI consumers are accessing the INI ecommerce portal from a PC at their home or what they consider to be a trusted PC. The most like threat to these types of machines / users is malware.
b. Initech Novelty Inc. (INI). I am selecting INI as a TCOMM for several reasons. First, The INI Security Manager thinks that the security vulnerability no longer makes INI 100% compliant with PCI-DSS. The security manager will be updating the INI PCI Self-Assessment Questionnaire (SAQ) to reflect a gap with requirement 6.5 (specifically 6.5.7). Thus, INI is its own threat because declaring non-compliance subjects them to non-compliance implications.
** The remainder of this post will be focused on TCOMM B – Initech Novelty Inc.**
3. Threat Event Frequency (TEF): TEF is the probable frequency, within a given time frame, that a threat agent will come into contact and act against an asset. For this step, I am going to select MODERATE or between 1 and 10 times per year. Here is why:
a. INI is a level three merchant. Level 3 merchants are required to complete a SAQ once per year. SAQs may be updated through-out the year as needed.
b. Keep in mind that self-reporting non-compliance does not mean a merchant will be fined. But it can be a pre-cursor to being fined (assuming no breach or other related incident).
*NOTE – It may make more sense to skip to Step Five and then come back to Step Four.
4. Threat Capability (TCAP); (Page 5 of the FAIR BRAG): The probable level of force that a threat agent (within a threat community) is capable of applying against an asset. For this step I am selecting a value of VERY HIGH; meaning that at least 98% of the threat community is capable of applying force (or reporting non-compliance) on INI’s PCI Compliance posture. Here is my reasoning:
a. INI wants to be ethical and not appear to be covering up vulnerabilities that affect compliance but also could harm consumer confidence in INI.
b. Given a and some of the information in the Control Resistance section, INI is highly capable of reporting self compliance.
5. Control Resistance (CR; aka Control Strength); (Page 6 of the FAIR BRAG): The expected effectiveness of controls, over a given time frame, as measured against a baseline level of force. The baseline level of force in this case is going to be the greater threat population. In most scenarios it is usually easy to differentiate between a “threat community” and the “threat population” it is part of. For this particular assessment (TCOMM B), they are the same – Initech Novelty Inc.
Because we are assessing risk in the context of a state of compliance versus more tangible concepts like threats and security controls – there could be some confusion about this step of the assessment. Here is my reasoning for selecting VERY LOW “Control Resistance”:
a. INI *has* to self report annually. Now a merchant could have found vulnerability after completing an SAQ and make a conscious decision to not update their SAQ – that is their choice and probably a whole different discussion.
b. In the spirit of optimism, I am assuming that INI takes PCI Compliance seriously and is risk averse in the sense they would rather declare non-compliancy versus have a breach or a related incident and be found to be non-compliant.
c. Finally, there are no other regulations, standards, or legal barriers (on-going litigation, security investigations, etc…) that would negate the need for INI to not self-report the vulnerability that makes them non-compliant. Thus, they *have* to and *want* to report; making the VERY LOW Control Resistance selection the most appropriate.
6. Vulnerability (VULN); (Page 7 of the FAIR BRAG): The probability that an asset will be unable to resist the actions of a threat agent. The basic FAIR methodology determines vulnerability via a look-up table that takes into consideration “Threat Capability” and “Control Resistance”.
a. In step four – Threat Capability (TCAP) – we selected a value of VERY HIGH.
b. In step five – Control Resistance (CR) – we selected a value of VERY LOW.
c. Using the TCAP and CR inputs in the Vulnerability table, we are returned with a vulnerability value of VERY HIGH.
7. Loss Event Frequency (LEF); (Page 8 of the FAIR BRAG): The probable frequency, within a given time frame, that a threat agent will inflict harm upon an asset. The basic FAIR methodology determines LEF via a look-up table that takes into consideration “Threat Event Frequency” and “Vulnerability”.
a. In step three – Threat Event Frequency (TEF) – we selected a value of MODERATE; between 1 and 10 times per year.
b. The outcome of step 6 was a VULN value of VERY HIGH.
c. Using the TEF and VULN inputs in the Loss Event Frequency table, we are returned with a LEF value of MODERATE.
*Note: the loss magnitude table used in the FAIR BRAG and the loss magnitude table for the Initech, Inc. scenarios are different. The Initech loss magnitude table can be viewed at the Initech, Inc. page of this blog.
8. Estimate Worst-Case Loss (WCL); (Page 9 of the FAIR BRAG): Now we want to start estimating loss values in terms of dollars. For the basic FAIR methodology there are two types of loss: worst case and probable (or expected) loss. The BRAG asks us to: determine the threat action that would most likely result in a worst-case outcome, estimate the magnitude for each loss form associated with that threat action, and sum the loss magnitude. For this step, I am going to select DISCLOSURE in the threat action columns and RESPONSE / FINES & JUDGMENTS / REPUTATION, in the loss form columns, with a WCL value of SIGNIFICANT (between $20,000 and $50,000). Here is why:
a. The most likely worst case scenario (assuming no breach or related security incident), is that INI gets fined for not being compliant. For level 1 or level 2 merchants we know that monthly fines for non-compliance can be between $5K and $25K. There is also a chance that INI’s processor could increase INI’s transaction fees for not being compliant.
b. Because INI does not store PAN in its web application, it is hard to envision a scenario where a large number of its consumers will have their payment card information breached all at one time. The Malware TCOMM better addresses this threat.
c. There is precedence for level three or four merchants being fined in cases of a breach incident. Again, we are not too concerned about a breach scenario but having at least one known fine at this merchant level let’s us contextualize a worst case scenario.
d. Given the above, I am estimating that worst case, that INI could be fined one or two thousand a month, plus there could be some RESPSONSE costs; a few thousand dollars, and maybe some reputation damage if the non-compliance is reported publicly. My estimate would be more around the $15k-$25k range, but I need to select the pre-defined FAIR BRAG range that best fits my estimates.
9. Estimate Probable Loss Magnitude (PLM); (Page 10 of the FAIR BRAG): In step eight, we focused on worst-case loss. Now we are going to focus on probable loss. Probable loss is for the most part always going to be lower then “worst case” loss. The BRAG asks us to: determine the threat action that would most likely result in an expected outcome, estimate the magnitude for each loss form associated with that threat action, and sum the loss magnitude. For this step, I am going to select DISCLOSURE in the threat action columns and RESPONSE, in the loss form columns, with a PLM value of LOW (between $1000 and $5,000).:
a. Since INI is going to update its SAQ and report non-compliance, there is a RESPONSE cost to performing this; between 5 and 10 hours.
b. Also, the Security Manager estimates that it will take between 20 and 30 hours of development time to mitigate the risk. This includes development, testing, implementation, and validation.
c. The security manager is assuming an internal resource cost of $75 per hour for the resources required to address a and b above; which results in an estimated cost of $3000.
d. Keep in mind we are looking for accuracy not precision. So the predefined range of between $1000 and $5000 (LOW) is the most appropriate selection.
10. Derive and Articulate Risk; (Page 11 of the FAIR BRAG): At this point in the basic FAIR methodology we can now derive a qualitative risk rating. Using the table on page 11 of the BRAG worksheet, we use the LEF value from step seven and the PROBABLE LOSS MAGNITUDE value from step nine to derive our overall qualitative risk label.
a. LEF value from step seven was MODERATE.
b. PLM from step nine was LOW.
c. Overall risk using the BRAG table on page 11 is MEDIUM.
In Part 4, I will summarize the risk assessment findings as well as summarize some possible mitigation solutions.
** Some personal notes on this part of the assessment. The “RESPONSE” loss form type has resulted in some interesting conversations. The concept of soft dollars and hard dollars comes up very often. Some business units only care about hard dollars (dollars going outside the company) and some business units only care about soft dollars (dollars within the company). As you are explaining response costs – it may make sense to highlight this differentiation. The way that I see it is that even by estimating “soft dollars” we are able to show that response takes away from other higher value activities that can help the business achieve its goals. This concept should not be discounted.
