BOTNET Research
BOTNET Research
HKUSpace Higher Diploma: information security final year project
Group # 4
HKUSpace Higher Diploma: information security final year project
Group # 4
20/21
20/21
Rain Eurel Esteva – 20109366
Chan Tak Pui – 20119608
Leung Ho Shek – 20037755
Hui Ka Ho – 20110749
Mak Chi Fung – 20110642
Contents
Project Objective 3
Proposed Solution 3
Project Schedule 3
Resource Allocation 4
References 7
Appendices 8
Project Objective
Our project objective is to research and learn about BotNets, their historic use and how they are carried out. We plan to write and implement our own basic BotNet within a controlled virtual environment.
Proposed Solution
We plan to simulate a small internal virtualized network of vulnerable machines in order to carry out our implementation. Using a three-tier BotNet design, we plan to write our own attack scripts in conjunction with various tools in order to achieve this attack narrative. Finally, we will propose remediation suggestions in order to best protect oneself from this attack.
Project Schedule
We plan to split this project up into four phases, each phase clearly separating all the major milestones of the project.
This is a tentative Gantt chart, which will layout the general duration of each phase.
Resource Allocation
We plan to use a project management application called “Trello” in order to organize and divide up all the various project tasks. Members are able to select these tasks for themselves whilst allowing the whole team to see each other’s progress. This tool gives the whole team insight into the deadlines, task details and requirements in order to better organize ourselves throughout the project duration.
Moreover , the general plan for manpower allocations is as follows;
• Phase I (Oct – Nov)
• Project Proposal : Everyone
• Environment Set-Up: Everyone
• Router/Networking: Rain E. Esteva
• Proxy Servers & Chaining: Mak Chi Fung
• Victim VMs: Chan Tak Pui & Leung Ho Shek
• Attack VM & C2 Server: Rain E. Esteva
• Phase II (Dec – Jan)
• Research Updates: Everyone
• Malware Development I: Everyone
• Credential Brute-Force Script: Hui Ka Ho
• Auto-Common Exploits Script: Leung Ho Shek
• Trojan Script: Mak Chi Fung
• Ransomware Script: Chan Tak Pui
• C2 Manager & Bot Binarie: Rain E. Esteva
• Interim Report: Everyone
• Partial-Integration: Everyone
• Phase III (Feb – Mar)
• Malware Development II: Everyone
• Full-Integration Tests: Everyone
• Phase IV (Apr)
• Presentation: Everyone
• Final Report: Everyone
Since this project will be utilizing a virtual environment, the group aims to host these guest operating systems in a contained homelab environment. This homelab environment will need to be able to run a moderate number of virtual machines, which will need considerable CPU power, and most importantly considerable RAM in order to carry out the proposed attack scenario.
References
Allan Liska, Timothy Gallo. (2016). Ransomware Defending Against Digital Extortion.
Craig Schiller, Jim Binkley. (2007). Botnets: The Killer Web App. https://doc.lagout.org/security/Botnets%20-%20The%20killer%20web%20applications.pdf
Engebretson, P. (2013). The basics of hacking and penetration testing: ethical hacking and penetration testing made easy. Elsevier Science
Georgia W. (2014). Penetration Testing: A Hands-On Introduction to Hacking. No Starch Press.
Justin, S. (2013). Black Hat Python: Python Programming for Hackers and Pentesters. No Starch Press.
Maynor, D. (2011). Metasploit toolkit for penetration testing, exploit development, and vulnerability research. Elsevier.
Mi.O’Leary. (2019). Cyber Operations: Building, Defending, and Attacking Modern Computer Networks (2nd ed.). Apress.
O’Connor, T.J. (2012). Violent Python A Cookbook for Hackers, Forensic Analysts, Penetration Testers, and Security Engineers. Newness.
Plohmann D., Gerhards-Padilla E.(2012). 2012 4th International Conference on Cyber Conflict. NATO CCD COE Publications. https://ccdcoe.org/uploads/2019/03/CyCon_book_2012.pdf
Stone-Gross, B., Cova, M., Cavallaro, L., Gilbert, B., Szydlowski, M., Kemmerer, R., … & Vigna, G. (2009, November). Your botnet is my botnet: analysis of a botnet takeover. In Proceedings of the 16th ACM conference on Computer and communications security (pp. 635-647).
Szor, P. (2005). The Art of Computer Virus Research and Defense. Pearson Education.
Tale, S. (2017). Hacking with Python: The ultimate beginners guide. North Charleston, SC: CreateSpace.
Vujanic, B., Maček, N., & Ž, S. (2017). An Implementation of Ransomware Malicious Software in Python. Retrieved 2020, from https://www.researchgate.net/publication/317753585_An_Implementation_of_Ransomware_Malicious_Software_in_Python
Appendices
Appendix A: Planned AoN Detailed
Appendix B: Planned Attack Stages