Many IBM i administrators have a comprehensive backup strategy, but for those who don’t, I’m hoping that this article will have you reworking how you approach backups.
Debbie Saugen was a colleague when I worked at IBM, and I’m happy to say she’s once again my colleague now that she’s joined HelpSystems. Debbie’s area of expertise is backup and recovery. Working with her again has reminded me of the security-related reasons to have a comprehensive backup strategy. Let’s take a look.
Data Retention Due to Regulatory Requirements
When people talk about data retention, most think of requirements to retain financial information. While that is a definite requirement, other regulatory requirements exist for other types of data. I’m specifically referring to audit journal receivers. These receivers are where audit journal information is kept. The Payment Card Industry Data Security Standard (PCI DSS) requires that you retain one year of audit data. In addition, the recently enacted New York Cybersecurity Law requires that audit journal receivers be retained for three years and database journal receivers retained for five years.
In many discussions with administrators, I’ve discovered that many organizations could not produce audit journal receivers for a specific date range. Either they don’t save receivers at all, or their tape rotation practices only provide receivers for the past three months, or the saves of receivers are performed too infrequently and some receivers have been previously removed and not saved.
To ensure you have a full set of journal receivers, examine how your audit journal receivers are saved and ensure you’d be able to produce a complete set if someone came to you and requested all the audit journal receivers for a specific two-week period, for example. Then, ensure your retention schedule keeps the receivers long enough to ensure regulatory compliance. If your organization is like many others, you’ll need to adjust how and when your journal receivers are saved and their save media retained.
Recovery from System Failure
While IBM i is incredibly reliable, systems occasionally fail or catastrophes happen in data centers and you have to do a full system recovery. Part of the recovery process is to restore user profiles, then restore objects, and then run restore authority to restore private authorities. My question is, how recent is your Save Security Data (SAVSECDTA)? If you perform a SAVSECDTA once a week, for example, do you have the forms, email requests, etc. to re-create all of the user profiles, authority changes, authorization list creations/deletions/modifications/assignments since the last SAVSECDTA? If not, you’re not saving your security information often enough.
Recovery from Making Changes
Cleaning up the system is a good thing. I always say that if it’s on the system, you need to care about it from a security perspective. I prefer that, if it’s not needed, it be removed from the system. This applies to inactive user profiles. Of course, prior to removing profiles—especially large numbers of profiles—it’s prudent to save all of the profiles currently on the system in case you accidentally delete a profile that’s needed.
Cleaning up also applies to back-level vendor products. Think of libraries containing financial data not legally required to remain on the system, or change management libraries. Ask yourself: are you really going to back out a change that was made three years ago? Then why are all the libraries containing rollback points still on your system? Other objects that need to be removed include copies of production libraries and individual files that are made prior to making a change or deleting records. I’m all for making a copy before starting on a major change, but once that change has been made and no problems have arisen, delete the copy!
The Payment Card Industry Data Security Standard (PCI DSS) and the recent New York State Cybersecurity Law both have requirements for purging data that is no longer in use. Most organizations don’t do that today, but I believe it will become more prevalent as more laws and regulations require it.
However, it should go without saying that a formal backup of data and user profiles should be made before removing them from the system, just in case they need to be restored.
Breach Recovery and Investigation
One question I get asked quite often is, “Carol, I don’t have time to look at reports from the audit journal, so why should I bother turning on auditing?” My response is that, even if you never look at a single entry in the audit journal, if you ever need to investigate a breach or incident, you need this information to perform an investigation. Yes, IBM i has been breached (due to misconfiguration by administrators, not weaknesses in the operating system). To perform a forensic investigation, it’s critical that you have a full set of audit journal receivers. And because breaches are often not discovered for several months after they start, it’s imperative that a complete set of audit journal receivers is saved—even when your organization isn’t under a regulatory requirement to do so. In the absence of a complete set of audit journal receivers, it will be quite difficult to perform a forensic investigation.
If hackers have infiltrated an organization and you determine that systems have been fully compromised, or you can’t determine whether a system has been compromised, or you’re unsure of whether you can fully clean up the breach, you may choose to completely rebuild the system. Hopefully, you’ve tested your disaster recovery procedures because you want to have a tried and true process when you’re trying to recover from a breach rather than testing it at that stressful time. And, once again, you’ll need to have a current SAVSECDTA to be able to restore user profiles, authorization lists, and private authorities to the most current settings possible.
Recovery from Malware
If you have a drive mapped from your workstation to anywhere in the Integrated File System (IFS), you are making the IFS available to be infected by malware. I’ve seen malware rename IFS directories as well as encrypt the contents of directories. IBM i is not immune to someone clicking on a link that downloads malware, infecting their workstation, and then infecting IBM i. To malware, IBM i looks like just another network drive, and away it goes, encrypting data, renaming directories, or whatever evil deed the malware is coded to perform. Your ability to recover from such an attack is as good as the last backup of the IFS. And if it has infected /QSYS.LIB, your last save of the libraries affected determines your ability to recover. If you think that you’ll just pay the ransom and not worry about your backups, think again. Ransomware is getting more insidious as time goes on. Some variants don’t provide you with the key even after the ransom (in bitcoin) is paid. Others look like they’ve simply encrypted the files but have actually deleted them. Bottom line: Do not assume that you can pay a ransom and get your data back.
Summary
Even though your backup practices may not be an obvious security topic, I hope that you’ve seen how a robust backup strategy will also help you with your organization’s security plan.
Carol Woodbury is President and CTO of DXR Security and has over 30 years’ experience with IBM i Security. She started her career as Security Team Leader and Chief Engineering Manager for iSeries Security at IBM in Rochester, MN. Since leaving IBM, she has co-founded two companies – SkyView Partners and DXR Security. Her current company - DXR Security - specializes in penetration testing for IBM i. Her practical experience together with her intimate knowledge of the system combine for a unique viewpoint and experience level that cannot be matched.
Carol is known world-wide as an author and award-winning speaker on security technology, specializing in IBM i Security topics. She has written seven books on IBM i Security. Carol has been named an IBM Champion since 2018 and holds her CISSP and CRISC security certifications.
MC Press books written by Carol Woodbury available now on the MC Press Bookstore.
 |
||
 |
|
IBM i Security Administration and Compliance: Third Edition Don't miss the newest edition by the industry’s #1 IBM i security expert. List Price $71.95 Now On Sale
|
 |
|
IBM i Security Administration and Compliance: Second Edition Get the must-have guide by the industry’s #1 security authority. List Price $71.95 Now On Sale
|
|
||
 |
|
IBM i Security Administration and Compliance For beginners to veterans, this is the definitive security resource. List Price $69.95
Now On Sale
|
More than ever, there is a demand for IT to deliver innovation. Your IBM i has been an essential part of your business operations for years. However, your organization may struggle to maintain the current system and implement new projects. The thousands of customers we've worked with and surveyed state that expectations regarding the digital footprint and vision of the company are not aligned with the current IT environment.
TRY the one package that solves all your document design and printing challenges on all your platforms. Produce bar code labels, electronic forms, ad hoc reports, and RFID tags – without programming! MarkMagic is the only document design and print solution that combines report writing, WYSIWYG label and forms design, and conditional printing in one integrated product. Make sure your data survives when catastrophe hits. Request your trial now! Request Now.
Forms of ransomware has been around for over 30 years, and with more and more organizations suffering attacks each year, it continues to endure. What has made ransomware such a durable threat and what is the best way to combat it? In order to prevent ransomware, organizations must first understand how it works.
Disaster protection is vital to every business. Yet, it often consists of patched together procedures that are prone to error. From automatic backups to data encryption to media management, Robot automates the routine (yet often complex) tasks of iSeries backup and recovery, saving you time and money and making the process safer and more reliable. Automate your backups with the Robot Backup and Recovery Solution. Key features include:
Business users want new applications now. Market and regulatory pressures require faster application updates and delivery into production. Your IBM i developers may be approaching retirement, and you see no sure way to fill their positions with experienced developers. In addition, you may be caught between maintaining your existing applications and the uncertainty of moving to something new.
IT managers hoping to find new IBM i talent are discovering that the pool of experienced RPG programmers and operators or administrators with intimate knowledge of the operating system and the applications that run on it is small. This begs the question: How will you manage the platform that supports such a big part of your business? This guide offers strategies and software suggestions to help you plan IT staffing and resources and smooth the transition after your AS/400 talent retires. Read on to learn:
LATEST COMMENTS
MC Press Online