Abstract
Computer-based simulation tools have an important role to play in helping us understand the behavior of people performing as attackers (people who launch cyberattacks) and defenders (people who protects computer networks against cyberattacks) in complex cyber situations. In this paper, we introduce a simulation tool called HackIt that could be used to build dynamic cyberattack scenarios. We used the HackIt tool to investigate the influence of timing of deception strategies involving honeypots (computers that pretend to be real, but those that are actually fake) on the decisions of participants performing as attackers. In a lab-based experiment, participants performing as attackers were randomly assigned to two between-subjects conditions, each involving six repeated games: early (N = 20) and late (N = 20). In early condition, deception was present via honeypots on the second and third games, whereas in late condition, deception was present via honeypots on the fourth and fifth games. Presence of deception meant that the honeypots were easy to exploit in deception rounds. In both conditions, the goal of attacker was to steal credit-card information for computers on the network. Results revealed that the proportion of honeypot attacks were higher in late condition compared to early condition. Similarly, we found that the proportion of regular attacks were lower in late condition compared to early condition. We highlight the potential of using the HackIt tool for creating realistic cyberscenarios and evaluating the effectiveness of different deception strategies in reducing cyberattacks.
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Acknowledgment
Palvi Aggarwal was supported by Visvesverya Ph.D. Scheme for Electronics and IT (IITM/DeitY-MLA/ASO/77), Department of Electronics and Information Technology, Ministry of Communication and IT, Government of India. Cleotilde Gonzalez was supported by the Army Research Laboratory under Cooperative Agreement Number W911NF-13-2-0045 (ARL Cyber Security CRA) to Cleotilde Gonzalez. Varun Dutt was supported by the Department of Science and Technology, Government of India award (award number: SR/CSRI/28/2013(G)) to Varun Dutt. The views and conclusions contained in this document are those of the authors and should not be interpreted as representing the official policies, either expressed or implied, of the Army Research Laboratory or the Indian or U.S. Government.
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Aggarwal, P., Gonzalez, C., Dutt, V. (2020). HackIt: A Real-Time Simulation Tool for Studying Real-World Cyberattacks in the Laboratory. In: Gupta, B., Perez, G., Agrawal, D., Gupta, D. (eds) Handbook of Computer Networks and Cyber Security. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-22277-2_39
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-22277-2_39
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