The purpose of every security team is to provide confidentiality, integrity and availability of the systems in the organization. We call it “CIA Triad” for short. Of those three elements, integrity is a key element for most compliance and regulations. Some organizations have realized this and decided to implement File Integrity Monitoring (FIM). But many of them are doing so only to meet compliance requirements such as PCI DSS and ISO 27001.

Effective cybersecurity is no longer relegated to deep-pocketed enterprises—a myriad of open source solutions can offer adequate protection to the most cash-strapped of organizations. That said, there are some capabilities free just won't get you, but how critical are they in the grand scheme of cyber resilience and are they worth the price tag? Tripwire and OSSEC are two popular solutions on opposite sides of this spectrum; let's see how they stack up.

Fee versus free, how do the two compare when it comes to intrusion detection? Specifically, how does the open source Advanced Intrusion Detection Environment (AIDE)—commonly referred to as the free Tripwire replacement—stack up against Tripwire Enterprise, the longstanding leader in this category?

Lateral movement is one of the most consequential types of network activity for which organizations need to be on the lookout. After arriving at the network, the attacker keeps ongoing access by essentially stirring through the compromised environment and obtaining increased privileges (known as “escalation of privileges”) using various tools and techniques. Attackers then use those privileges to move deeper into a network in search of treasured data and other value-based assets.

In this blog, we will explore suspicious file activity inside a container and see how to effectively implement a file integrity monitoring (FIM) workflow. We’ll also cover how Sysdig Secure can help you implement FIM for both containers and Linux hosts.

We all know there are a number of different security devices that need to be continually monitored because they represent attack vectors. That’s why understanding configuration management is critical to security hygiene. As practitioners, we need to adhere to CIS controls as they provide a critical baseline for maintaining our security framework and keeping up our integrity monitoring processes.

Nowadays, most of the IT systems use file-based architectures to store and process information. In addition, the critical applications such as operating systems, application binaries, configuration data of systems and applications, organization’s sensitive data, logs, and data which is pertinent to security events are stored in files. If any of these files is compromised, the financial and reputational damage occur to organizations.

In the world of cyber warfare, the internet has become a vital part of every walk of life. When it comes to downloading a file from the internet to your laptop or PC, you cannot be guaranteed a 100% safety due to the existence of fast and sophisticated cyber threats. Security vulnerabilities, data breaches, viruses, and malware have become very common and result in exploitation of the originality, integrity, and authenticity of any file you download from the internet.

If you are familiar with IT security, you must have heard CIA triad: a security model that covers different parts of IT security. Being one member of CIA triad, file integrity refers to the processes and implementations aiming to protect data from unauthorized changes such as cyber attacks. A file’s integrity tells if the file has been altered by unauthorized users after being created, while being stored or retrieved.

The importance of a mature vulnerability management program can’t be overstated. File integrity monitoring (FIM) and security configuration management (SCM) might be the bedrock of a strong cybersecurity program, but they can only go so far. Scanning for vulnerabilities needs to be a foundational part of your program, too.