Free NSA Guidance for Addressing Malicious Code Risk and vocabulary list

The property that ensures that the actions of an entity can be traced uniquely to the entity.

Software whose primary function is generating revenue by advertising targeted at the user of the

computer on which the software resides.

Anything observed in the documentation or operation of software that deviates from expectations

based on previously verified software products or reference documents.

Anything that has value (e.g. data, executing process) to a stakeholder (e.g. organization who

owns it).

Grounds for confidence that an entity meets its security objectives.

Timely, reliable access to data and information services for authorized users.

Property of data or software that ensures that it is operational at or above the minimum level of

performance and accessible by all of its intended users.

Surreptitious mechanism used to circumvent security controls and provide access. Synonymous

with trap door.

An action in which more data is placed into a buffer or data holding area than the capacity that

has been allocated by the system. Synonymous with buffer overrun.

Software or hardware products developed and distributed by commercial suppliers. COTS

software products are ready-made and made available for sale, lease, or license (usually for a

fee) to the general public.

Assurance that information is not disclosed to unauthorized individuals, processes, or devices.

(1) The degree to which software is free from faults in its specification, design, and

implementation. (2) The degree to which software, documentation, or other items meet specified

requirements. (3) The degree to which software, documentation, or other items meet user needs

and expectations, whether those needs/expectations are specified or not.

Newly developed software, most often for use in a specific system or application, where the

government has control over its development. Contrast with “pre-existing software”.

Prevention of authorized access to a system resource or the delaying of system operations and

functions.

Integrating concept that encompasses the following attributes—reliability, safety,

maintainability, integrity, availability. When addressing security, additional attributes have great

prominence—confidentiality and accountability.

The difference between a computed, observed, or measured value or condition and the true,

specified, or theoretically correct value or condition.

An occurrence of some specific data, situation, or activity.

Pertaining to a system or component that automatically places itself in a safe operating mode in

the event of a failure. See also fault secure and fault tolerance.

Pertaining to a system or component that automatically places itself in a secure operating mode

in the event of a failure.

The inability of a system or component to perform its required functions within specified

performance requirements.

The adjudged or hypothesized cause of an error.

Software and hardware products that are developed by the technical staff of the government

agency for which it is created or by an external entity, but with funding and specifications from

the agency. Agencies can directly control all aspects of GOTS products.

High-consequence software systems are those in which a failure could result in serious harm to a

human being in the form of loss of life, physical injury or damage to health, loss of political

freedom, loss of financial well-being, or disastrous damage to the human’s environment.

software systems that support a very large number of software users are also considered

high-consequence because they are not only difficult to recover after a failure, but because it

would be extremely difficult and/or expensive to make reparations to the affected humans for the

damages that would result from such a failure. Examples of high-consequence software systems

include the software elements of national security systems, medical control systems, banking

systems, Supervisory Control And Data Acquisition (SCADA) systems for critical

infrastructures, and electronic voting systems.

Aspects or non-functional requirements. They are so-named because most of them end in "-ility."

A subset of them (Reliability, Availability, Serviceability, Usability, and Installability) are

together referred to as "RASUI".

Protection and defense of information and information systems by ensuring their availability,

integrity, authentication, confidentiality, and non-repudiation. These measures include providing

for restoration of information systems by incorporating protection, detection, and reaction

capabilities.

Property of data or software that assures that it has not been altered or destroyed in an

unauthorized manner.

Quality of an information system reflecting the logical correctness and reliability of the operating

system; the logical completeness of the hardware and software implementing the protection

mechanisms; and the consistency of the data structures and occurrence of the stored data. Note

that, in a formal security mode, integrity is interpreted more narrowly to mean protection against

unauthorized modification or destruction of information.

The actions, arguments, and evidence that collectively provide a basis for justified reduction in

uncertainty.

Principle requiring that each subject be granted the most restrictive set of privileges needed for

the performance of that subject’s authorized tasks. Application of this principle limits the

damage that can result from accident, error, or unauthorized use of a component or system.

(1) Malicious software that will adversely affect systems under certain conditions such as at a

certain time or upon receipt of a certain packet. (2) Resident computer program triggering an

unauthorized act when particular states of an IS are realized.

Software or firmware intended to perform an unauthorized process that will have adverse impact

on the confidentiality, integrity, availability or accountability of an information system. Also

known as malicious software.

A MOTS (either modified or modifiable off-the-shelf, depending on the context) whose code has

been modified.

Existing software that is potentially available. Includes COTS, MOTS, and GOTS.

Security testing in which evaluators attempt to violate security properties of a system.

A method of redirecting Internet traffic to a fake web site through domain spoofing.

Tricking individuals into disclosing sensitive personal information through the use of e-mails

that appear to originate from a trusted source.

An existing software component or software product that has been obtained for use rather than

custom-developed (i.e., built “from scratch”) for the system in which it will be used. Pre-existing

software could be used as a “stand alone” application or service or could be integrated into a

larger “pre-existing” or custom-developed system. Pre-existing software may be “off-the-shelf”

(e.g., commercial off-the-shelf (COTS), government off-the-shelf (GOTS), modified off-theshelf

(MOTS), or any other variation of *OTS), “legacy”, freeware, open source, or shareware.

An implementation-independent set of security requirements for a category of IT products or

systems that meet specific consumer needs.

The ability of a system or component to perform its required functions correctly and predictably

under stated conditions for a specified period of time.

The potential that a given threat will exploit vulnerabilities of an asset or group of assets and

thereby cause harm to the organization. It is measured in terms of a combination of the

probability of an event and its consequence. [Source: ISO/IEC 13335-1:2005 Information

technology—Security techniques—Management of information and communications technology

security—Part 1: Concepts and models for information and communications technology security

management] Combination of the probability of an event and its consequence. [Source: ISO/IEC

Guide 73:2002 Risk management. Vocabulary. Guidelines for use in standards]

The degree to which a component or system can function correctly in the presence of invalid

inputs or stressful environmental conditions, including those that are intentionally and

maliciously created.

A set of tools designed to conceal an attacker and offer a backdoor after the attacker has

compromised the machine. [Source: Hoglund, Greg, and Gary McGraw. Exploiting Software:

How to break code. Addison-Wesley, 2004]

Software whose failure could have an impact on a system’s security. See high-consequence

software.

Software in which there is a high (though not absolute) level of justifiable confidence in the

presence of a substantial set of explicit security properties and functionality, including all those

required for its intended usage. For software to be secure it must avoid defects in its

implementation that introduce vulnerabilities regardless of whether the majority of development

involves either from-scratch coding or integration/assembly of acquired or reused software

components.

All aspects related to defining, achieving, and maintaining confidentiality, integrity, availability,

non-repudiation, accountability and authenticity.

Security-enforcing software is a portion of software that (based on system architecture) is

responsible for enforcing the system security policy.

Security-relevant software is a portion of software that (based on system architecture) is not itself

responsible for enforcing the system security policy, but is in a position to subvert the

enforcement of it.

To obtain software development services or software products, whether by contract or by other

means (e.g., downloading open source software from the Internet).

The level of confidence that software is free of vulnerabilities, either intentionally or

unintentionally designed or inserted during software’s development and/or the entire software

life cycle. [There are a number of other definitions of Software Assurance. See

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Software_Assurance.]

Programs that observe and report on users; any technology that aids in gathering information

about a person or organization without their knowledge.

An agreement among any number of organizations that defines certain characteristics,

specification, or parameters related to a particular aspect of computer technology.

Changing (process or) product so as to provide a means to compromise security.

An IT product or system and its associated guidance documentation that is the subject of an

evaluation.

Testing is an activity performed for evaluating product quality, and for improving it, by

identifying defects and problems. The verification of behavior of a program on a finite set of test

cases, suitably selected from the usually infinite executions domain, against the expected

behavior. The five most prevalent types of software/system testing are: Penetration,

Interoperability, Acceptance, Vulnerability, and Functionality.

A potential cause of an incident that may result in harm to a system or organization.

Any circumstance or event with the potential to adversely impact an Information System through

unauthorized access, destruction, disclosure, modification of data, and/or denial of service.

Malicious program that masquerades as a benign application.

A relationship between two elements, a set of activities and a security policy in which element x

trusts element y if and only if x has confidence that y will behave in a well defined way (with

respect to the activities) that does not violate the given security policy.

An entity is considered trustworthy only when there is sufficient credible evidence leading one to

believe that the entity will satisfy a set of given requirements.

Self-replicating, malicious code that attaches itself to an application program or other executable

system component and leaves no obvious signs of its presence.

A weakness in an asset or group of assets. An asset’s weakness could allow it to be exploited and

harmed by one or more threats. [Source: ISO/IEC 13335-1:2004-11-15 (earlier draft of 13335-

1:2005)]

Process to embed information into software in a manner that makes it hard to remove by an

adversary without damaging the software’s functionality. Commonly referred to as “digital

watermarking, or DWM”.

A weakness is an inadequacy in a portion of a computer system’s hardware or software that

makes that system susceptible to subversion, theft of information, or sabotage by an attacker. A

weakness could be the result of an intentional or inadvertent flaw in the design, an error in the

implementation, or an inadequacy in another aspect of the software life cycle process. If the

weakness exists in one of the technological components of the system (e.g., an algorithm, a

sequence of code, a configuration setting), and is exploitable by an attacker, the weakness is

termed a vulnerability. However, not all weaknesses are vulnerabilities. Some weaknesses

originate from inadequacies in non-technical aspects of the system, such as the system’s

requirements specification, security policy, or administrative or operating procedures.

A computer program that can run independently, can propagate a complete working version of

itself onto other hosts on a network, and may consume computer resources destructively.