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How to Approach Customers with Security Issues?
stuntshell asks: "We're a group of IT Professionals and we're starting our own consulting firm. We're most systems administrators, and not business admin, nor lawyers, and we're all have worked on big companies and most of the time the job to be performed was just passed on to us. The scope of the work we're about to perform will be security related, so how do you approach a customer in this kind of business? Do you wait for them to come and ask you to test their firewall? Or do you go scanning and discovering holes on other's network for you to offer them your solution? Do write a letter/email or do you propose a meeting? What works?"
and you give him a budget big enough to do his job. You know, sales? The basis of business? Oh, didn't think you'd need that? Note to investors: GET OUT NOW.
How we know is more important than what we know.
Or do you go scanning and discovering holes on other's network for you to offer them your solution?
Boy, does that sound like an astonishingly bad idea. Sorta like a locksmith picking the lock on your front door, coming inside and offering to sell you a better lock. Sounds to me like a great way to get shot.
Figuratively speaking, of course.
Get submittal about your company approved on Slashdot ... oh s*it ... forgot to post our URL!
Every company reads about you and wants to hire you.
Profit
Hulk SMASH Celiac Disease
Sniffing me, then emailing me to plug the holes for a price is almost the equivalent of blackmail. This may earn you one of 2 things:
1) A very nasty letter from either management or legal telling you to cease and desist
2) From the more nasty management/legal, a call to the police..
The best way really, is the more conventional way, advertise, network and otherwise legitimately promote your business, this gray area finding holes and near-blackmail will get you more grief than it's worth.
By the way and offtopic: I woulda probably had first post if my new kitten didn't continuously stomp on my keyboard. Cans of air certainly are handy...
...in bed
Along with Bubba, and his trusty baseball bat.
Unless you want to end up in jail. No matter how good your intentions are, someone is going to think you're trying to extort money from them, and they're going to call the police. Then the only holes you'll have to worry about protecting will be your own.
Absofreakinglutely do **NOT** any such thing. **NEVER** intrude on a network unless you have **EXPLICIT** **WRITTEN** authorization to do so. You're going to be very, very sorry if you make a practice of doing such things.
I realize that it's impossible to make this point here without a stream of common-sense-impaired nerds lining up to insist that some stupid analogy makes unauthorized intrusion a great idea. You can listen to them or listen to me...
What I'm listening to now on Pandora...
I would suggest brushing up on your English if you plan on conducting business in English speaking countries. I would also highly recommend against attacking a company's network pre-emptively without their express written approval and a solidly established rules of engagement. Anything less is likely to land your ass in jail very quickly. An attacker coming to me offering "consulting services" is akin to a mobster offering his protection to local businesses for a weekly fee. You may very seriously want to consider partnering with someone with some experience establishing, managing, and growing a small business, even if it's not previously computer related experience. The business experience will probably prove invaluable to you and save you a lot of headaches down the road.
As far as "getting the sale", what worked for salespeople that sold goods/services - security or otherwise - to your previous company/companies? That might be a good place to start. If you were never brought into sales-discussions, you might want to ask yourselves "why not?".
What you *definitely* want to do is perform unauthorized scans and/or penetration attempts on a potential customer's external firewalls and/or servers. That will most assuredly endear you to them. Why, they might even ask to have a police escort for you!
One of the last things you should do is approach a new career in security consulting without really knowing that part of the IT world like the back of your hand (and not just the tech bits).
(Have you considered starting up a Starbucks franchise instead?)
Mind the gap...
You perform what is in the "scope of the work". Nothing more, nothing less.
You can OFFER to widen the scope once you are onsite if you suspect that there are other things wrong, but you should never go poking around.
Or do you go scanning and discovering holes on other's network for you to offer them your solution?
I believe that's called extortion. Watch your step.
Speak truth to power.
Is it too late to get your old job back?
- For the complete works of Shakespeare: cat
I have to say, I love your sig. :) That one and its variations (here we use "...between the sheets.") go well with anything. And the end of your post set it up perfectly.
Well, speaking from my experience at a fairly successful consultancy business, I think there are a couple of strategies. First, there are some key skills you all need:
1) Distinguish yourself as a group that provides "practical, effective" security. Never leave any of your first customers wondering why they paid you.
2) Solve the problems they want solved rather than the problems you think should be solved. Don't go tell the customer what they need you to do; instead, listen to what they say are the problems and solve them.
3) Brutally asses all the communication skills of your team. Know who your great communicators are, and who are the people you need to hide from the customer. Face it, as a consulting firm, it matters most how you interact with the customer.
As far as strategies go:
1) I bet your primary battle will be convincing people that it's worth investing in security. Start gathering factual stories of security failures so that you can talk about specific incidents and what happened. Be prepared to explain to a non-technical user why they should spend money - and make sure it's completely relevant to them.
For instance, I worked at a web-firm that doesn't really care about security... but they also have about 12,000 social security numbers in one of their databases. When we tried to push "network security" in general, there was no traction. When we asked "what if we have to announce to all our customers that their SSN's were stolen from our database?", that allowed us to push for greater security controls.
2) Consider focusing on the "virus-protection" market. I know a lot of small businesses completely struggle with Windows viruses that can bring down the network. Since good network security can help stop the spread of viruses, it might be a reasonable fit. "Stop the havoc that viruses cause" is a strong selling point.
3) Maybe offer a "security review and emergency assistance when needed" package. Basically, you do a review of their network for a nominal fee and then you're available for emergency issues if they have a security issue. Sell it as "now you'll know who to call if you really have a problem."
Once you get in to do the review, you can even make some suggestions to improve logging/auditing so that you can respond better in an emergency.
4) Get some street cred. Publish some articles on security issues, find a security weakness in Mozilla (we just heard that it's buggier than IE, right?) and get your name out there as a "security firm".
As an alternative, answer questions on newsgroups or forums. If you're good, you can get a rep as knowing your shit by answering people's questions. Sometimes, the sysadmin who asks for help could really use a consulting group instead.
Finally, one last piece of advice:
1) Always treat your clients' problems more seriously than they treat them. If your clients are a little concerned, you need to be very concerned. If they're satisfied, you need to be slightly concerned. And don't just sound like you're taking them more seriously - take them more seriously! If the client thinks it's a little problem, treat it like a big problem and get it fixed right away. If it's a big problem, treat it like it's the end of the world.
I know it sounds silly, but it means that every time your customers contact you, they will always get the impression that you're more on top of the problem and solution than they are. And that, in the consulting world, is gold!
Good luck.
-Peter
If you really are puzzled how to market, prepare a flyer, in humanized terms, of what you do, and offer a little up front. Perhaps you can, for example, offer a port scan as an opening, and show them, again, in humanized and non-geek terms, just what that means and what you can do. Basically, you're offering them a free evaluation. You don't want to give them so much info they can give someone the report and have them fix it, but that way they feel like they're getting a nice demo, something for free, and it creates a sense of good will that can help you sell your services.
I worked for a network security business in Denver. We did good work but found something very interesting.
Most businesses were not concerned with actual security but more interested in what name they could put on their website that says "Secured by _______"
Because of this the business died since we hadn't made a name for ourselves. Sure some people were genuinely interested in security, but not enough to support a business.
If you're going to deal with security, keep it on the down low and offer it as a secondary service. As expensive as security audits are, name means more than anything. If your company isn't widely known for security, you'll find doing security jobs hard to get as a primary offering.
Treat it just like any other project that uses a cyclic lifecycle management. I'm supposing you already have your foot in the door, you are just unsure as to how to conduct yourself. At the end of each round, the customer can decide if they like the kind of progress being made and has the option to cancel the contract after each round if they disagree with methods or results. Start small and simple and develop their trust. If they really have security problems, you are best off finding a way to make them want to change rather than just telling them off.
Round 1: Spend one week writing a paper on the intellectual or physical property deemed essential to the company, and then document what measures the company believes they are practicing to protect them. At this point, you should also define your known enemies, be it a competitor or vast amounts of time wasted during virus outbreaks. Don't dwell on anything but the obvious as we all learned in the Six Dumbest Ideas In Computer Security document.
Round 2: Propose a paper exercise approach to physical security, both in the server room and in the cubicle farms. Spend a week and not too much money. This will confirm or deny that declared in Round 1.
Round 3: Address disaster recovery options because arson and other DOS techniques are just as bad for protecting IP as is an electronic attack. This is a check to see if the current protections methods covered this usually underfunded area. Don't forget offsites.
Round 4: Propose, via contractual methods, solutions for closing gaping holes in the protection measures. That is, cover the areas for which no protection is provided, be it physical, procedural, or electronic. Implement if approved and have alternate, albeit less-effective approaches for those rejected due to cost or time.
Round 5: Propose a development area be established to test current and future configurations of electronic equipment for known attack vectors (e.g. new patches on a firewall don't open new ports). [At this stage, your customer has confidence that you know what you're doing, but it took you this long before you really started touching the inside of their network.] You never subject the production network to most scans, except maybe for proper patch deployment. All the exploit attempts happen in the lab.
Round 6: Like every good reader of Bruce Schneier's Secrets and Lies , you now propose methods and procedures for monitoring and reacting to attacks against the core intellectual or physical property documented in Round 1. Depending on your company goals, you can hope to win this one, or you can let them run the service while you move on to another customer.
Tips: If you get lots of resistance at Round 1 telling you that you aren't moving fast enough, beware because you will be the victim of the blame game in Round 6. Don't forget that sometimes the attack vector is physical theft - encrypt core files anywhere they are found, most especially on laptops. Round 1 may have identified Internet access as a risk, so in Round 4, consider using a private, internal network and force all users to use thin-client tools for Internet access - no removable media, highly-enforced group policies, and the ability to quarantine viruses at the door. For that matter, proxy all Internet access and monitor it in Round 6.
Soliciting business from places that are highly regulated (banking, medicine) as far as privacy is concerned. Mention things like Gramm-Leach-Bliley (GLB) and HIPAA and how vulnerable those businesses are.
A fine is a tax you pay for doing wrong and a tax is a fine you pay for doing all right.
This question should've been titled:
"How do I perform a security audit?"
It's clear from the phrasing that you have no idea what system security actually is, so instead of asking how do you market it, and how do you talk to people about it, it'd probably be a good idea to understand it yourself.
Here are some hints:
* Real security professionals don't "test anyone's firewall."
* Real security professionals don't "discover" holes. They prove them.
It sounds like what you really want to know is "how do I go about charging people for my script collection?" which is a shameful thing indeed.
You are the reason business is booming for me, so while I despise everything you are, I will also offer you advise:
Learn how to build a secure system. Sell that. Sell the solution for customers that is a secure system. Don't offer to tell them what's wrong, but tell them what's right.
these days, infiltrating a company's network is considered cyber-terrorism, and instead of a contract you'll get charged with a few felonies. I think someone suggested a sales manager. much better idea. I would suggest a sales manager who writes well.
DO NOT scan/test a company's network without their permission! This is the fast track to a jail cell. Like QuantumG said (albeit a little sarcastically), get a sales manager and expect to pay out a lot of money in advertising.
If you think you're post was well composed, I would recommend some English/technical writing classes. If you recognize your post has some grammar problems and you know your writing skills are good, I would not worry about it.
Check out Bruce Schneier, Counterpane Internet Security, or SecurityFocus. Gibson Research Corporation is another site to check out. This is just a start to getting some background on the basics and depth of IT "security".
I would say from the post you are not coming from a security background. Assuming you have an IT Bachelors degree, the minimum I would recommend is for you to study for some basic security certifications (such as the CompTIA Security+ and the MCSE/MCSA: Security on Windows Server 2003 specialization) and take them if you have not already. On top of this, I would recommend doing research into security conferences and possibly even local university classes on IT security (although I recommend these with a grain of salt as there is a lot of variance between the quality and type of information offered currently). There are whole books written on this subject, so visit your local bookstores and research what they have available. My rule of thumb in evaluating books is to see how in depth they get with their subjects. If they just talk in general about their subjects with no specific examples, I typically look for something else (unless it is an introductory book, of course).
Finally, just remember security is different to everyone (even in the business/corporate world). One company might just need you to identify their weak spots, patch them, and setup a plan to make sure they stay patched. Another company might need you to analyze everything from weak spots/patches to physical security of IT assets. Your job as a consultant would be to identify what they need (Business 101).
Hope this helps.
I would definitely get someone to proofread anything you would send to a potential customer so you don't sound like a complete ass or, even worse, a scam artist. I'm serious about that. If you can't take the time to read over what you've just typed and think to yourself "does this make sense?" why would I want to hire you to perform security audits for my company? If you have that little attention to detail, what would you miss when working for me on my network?
1) Scan wide swaths of the internet for problems. 2) Find a vulnerable server, and break in. 3) Hack any existing security on said server to bits, leaving it completely open. 4) Offer to fix their security. 5) If they refuse the offer, make them regret their decision by repeating steps 1 through 3 until they call you back.
/usr/games/fortune
This had a different connotation for me "Sniffing me, then emailing me to plug the holes for a price". Think: Traci Lords, Jenna Jameson.
Thanks I just read what you had to say, and found it quite interesting, honest! that sounds like a good idea, really it borders right about in the middle. Maybe I should have read what you had to say before I poked my own comments in, but cheers really :)
tag, my apologies. I tried to come up with the lamest analogy possible.
Protect your liberties. Donate to the ACLU
Sniffing me, then offering to plug the holes for a price is almost the equivalent of blackmail. This may earn you one of 2 things: ...and in a bar, this kind of behavior will almost *certainly* get you slapped, hard.
- Sir! Sir! You'd have a security hole! You'd owned
[kicks, screams]
- Please, where are you going? Don't leave me!
At work we have an ftp server, the purpose of which is to share files between people in various locations and from various organizations working on the same project. Out IT manager insists that everyone who wants to use this ftp-server first gives his/her IP-address to him, so he can open the server for that specific address. This server has never been hacked. Needless to say it's never been used either.
-- Cheers!
This reminds me of a little story that happened to a customer who I was working for in the late nineties.
Said customer wanted to have their (large) network audited for security issues and hired an "established security firm" to do the job. As a first step it was decided that these experts had to try to break into the network from the outside, and they promised to report within a certain time frame.
When the time had come, the customer called them up and asked about the report. The experts said they were still working hard, but from what they had seen the network seemed completely impenetrable. The customer's network admins had not noticed any strange activity or alarming attempts, and asked about the methods used, and the experts gladly explained:
They had gathered a list of public host names via DNS and found an entry firewall.customersdomain.com. From then on they had tried to gain access to or through firewall.customersdomain.com in all possible means and using every tool at hand, but they had not succeeded.
This explanation caused a fair amount of laughter amongst the admins. The DNS entry firewall.customersdomain.com had been created a while ago to perform some tests, but the machine correspoding to the IP address had been disconnected from the net months ago.
As an IT manager, I receive these types of offers on a weekly basis. When I do, I request an e-mail so I can track who sent the request and then add them to my list of suspects.
Any request to scan or security test my network is immediately perceived to be hostile. It's called social engineering and it is one of the most effective security attacks. It's not a good opening line.
If you want my security business, first you need to win my trust with non security work.
Otherwise you risk running afoul of computer trespass laws...
- "History shows again and again how nature points out the folly of men" -- Blue Oyster Cult, 'Godzilla'
IT Dude: We need to hire these guys to do an audit
Boss: Why? Aren't you doing your job? What am I paying you IT guys for?
I've seen variations on this numerous times at various companies.
I'll go you one better.
I had a client (now ex-client, thankfully) who managed to get a very bad name in the web-hosting industry. Unpaid bills, cheated partners, traded stolen equipment, etc. Decided to start all over again, so he changed the name of his company, and pointed the old DNS entries to an ex-partner's company (or the ex-partner kept them).
A year or so later, in comes some snotty young dutch hac^Wwanna-be security team, to pay him a visit. They point out all the holes in his security, have copies of logs from network management machines, figured out the passwords on the routers, etc. Only problem was that the network wasn't his, but another company's. The other company was not thrilled, and had been cleaning up after all the break-ins and the damage done. So the police were called, but they declined to prosecute after throwing a big scare into the pre-pubescent idiots. I hear a few civil cases are still proceeding against them.
the AC
Hemos is like...sci-fi fans;he thinks technology is cool, but he hasn't bothered to understand the science it's based on
A good sales person with good contacts with the industry can do the magic. I am not quite convinced that by doing a scan and mailing them to offer the service works. Infact it may bounce back as well ;)
Target SME/SMBs and keep your price attractive. there are tons of internet bases firms which offer remote scans. You shall be able to differentiate with them. Based on your experience and skills if you can provide a better customized service with a competetive price tag then you can make your mark on the industry.
Its not quite easy but to reach the peak you should work hard.
my best wishes to you.
Srikrishna Komatineni
Approach them using a browser pop-up window telling the user that her system is insecure and and that she needs to click the pop-up to fix it. Then take the user to a website where she has to fill in some data (such as Credit Card number + security code + billing address ) name etc. Then, just to convince her that her system really is insecure, you might choose to make some random purchases with that info. You might use it to purchase some mailing lists that you can then use to send buisness offers to select customers (selected by whoever composed that mailing list) If she entered her ISP username and password that is required so you can fix her network problem then you can use it to mail your offers. You should check first if this buisness model is not patented. I've seen it used in the past (though I have not clicked on the pop-up so my network is still insecure...
Your best choice is to make them come to you instead of telling them you just happened to break their box.
And please don't pay attention to the racists retards here in slashdot, no matter what you speak it was worth asking!