Methods and Systems for Enabling Community-Tested Security Features for Legacy Applications

• US 20100154027A1
• Filed: 12/17/2008
• Published: 06/17/2010
• Est. Priority Date: 12/17/2008
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: CA, Inc. (d/b/a CA Technologies) (Broadcom, Inc.)
• Original Assignee: Symantec Corporation (NortonLifeLock Inc.)
• Inventors: Sobel, William E., Satish, Sourabh
• Granted Patent: US 8,713,687 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 726/1
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 21/125 by manipulating the program code, e.g. source code, compiled code, interpreted code, machine code
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 21/126 Interacting with the operating system
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 21/552 involving long-term monitoring or reporting
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 21/577 Assessing vulnerabilities and evaluating computer system security
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 21/604 Tools and structures for managing or administering access control systems
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 63/1433 Vulnerability analysis
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 63/145 the attack involving the propagation of malware through the network, e.g. viruses, trojans or worms
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 63/20 for managing network security; network security policies in general filtering policies H04L63/0227

Abstract

A computer-implemented method for enabling community-tested security features for legacy applications may include: 1) identifying a plurality of client systems, 2) identifying a legacy application on a client system within the plurality of client systems, 3) identifying a security-feature-enablement rule for the legacy application, 4) enabling at least one security feature for the legacy application by executing the security-feature-enablement rule, 5) determining the impact of the security-feature-enablement rule on the health of the legacy application, and then 6) relaying the impact of the security-feature-enablement rule on the health of the legacy application to a server. Various other methods, systems, and computer-readable media are also disclosed.

Claims

1. A computer-implemented method for enabling community-tested security features for legacy applications, the method comprising:

identifying a legacy application on a client system;

identifying a security-feature-enablement rule for the legacy application;

enabling at least one security feature for the legacy application by executing the security-feature-enablement rule;

determining the impact of the security-feature-enablement rule on the health of the legacy application;

relaying the impact of the security-feature-enablement rule on the health of the legacy application to a server.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein identifying the security-feature-enablement rule comprises receiving the security-feature-enablement rule from the server.

3. The method of claim 1, wherein determining the impact of the security-feature-enablement rule on the health of the legacy application comprises:

performing a first health evaluation prior to executing the security-feature-enablement rule;

after executing the security-feature-enablement rule, performing a second health evaluation;

comparing the second health evaluation with the first health evaluation to determine how the security-feature-enablement rule impacted the health of the legacy application.

4. The method of claim 1, further comprising, prior to identifying the security-feature-enablement rule, identifying a request from a user to opt in to early testing of security-feature-enablement rules.

5. The method of claim 1, further comprising transmitting a list to the server that identifies each legacy application on the client system.

6. The method of claim 1, wherein the security-feature-enablement rule comprises a particular combination of security-feature-enablement rules.

7. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

receiving an instruction from the server to disable the security-feature-enablement rule for the legacy application;

disabling the security-feature-enablement rule for the legacy application.

8. The method of claim 1, wherein executing the security-feature-enablement rule comprises:

identifying startup of the legacy application;

retrieving a security configuration for the legacy application;

enabling a security feature in the security configuration as specified by the security-feature-enablement rule.

9. A computer-implemented method for enabling community-tested security features for legacy applications, the method comprising:

identifying a plurality of client systems;

identifying a subset of the plurality of client systems that is designated to test security features for legacy applications;

transmitting a security-feature-enablement rule to at least one client system in the subset;

receiving, from the client system in the subset, health-impact information that identifies the impact of the security-feature-enablement rule on the health of a legacy application on the client system;

determining, based on the health-impact information, whether to roll out the security-feature-enablement rule to the plurality of client systems.

10. The method of claim 9, further comprising:

determining that the security-feature-enablement rule did not negatively impact the health of the legacy application;

initiating a staged roll-out of the security-feature-enablement rule to the plurality of client systems.

11. The method of claim 10, further comprising:

receiving, from at least one additional client system within the plurality of client systems, health-impact information for the security-feature-enablement rule;

determining that the security-feature-enablement rule negatively impacted the health of a legacy application on the additional client system;

aborting the staged roll-out of the security-feature-enablement rule.

12. The method of claim 10, wherein initiating the staged roll-out comprises increasing distribution of the security-feature-enablement rule by increments in multiple stages until the distribution encompasses the plurality of client systems.

13. The method of claim 9, wherein the security-feature-enablement rule comprises a particular combination of security-feature-enablement rules.

14. The method of claim 9, wherein the health-impact information comprises:

a performance index containing results for at least one performance metric;

a stability index containing results for at least one stability metric.

15. A system for enabling community-tested security features for legacy applications, the system comprising a client module programmed to:

identify a legacy application on a client system;

identify a security-feature-enablement rule for the legacy application;

enable at least one security feature for the legacy application by executing the security-feature-enablement rule;

determine the impact of the security-feature-enablement rule on the health of the legacy application;

relay the impact of the security-feature-enablement rule on the health of the legacy application to a server.

16. The system of claim 15, further comprising a server module programmed to:

identify a plurality of client systems;

identify a subset of the plurality of client systems that designated to test security features for legacy applications;

transmit the security-feature-enablement rule to at least one client system in the subset;

receive, from the client system in the subset, health-impact information that identifies the impact of the security-feature-enablement rule on the health of a legacy application on the client system;

determine, based on the health-impact information, whether to roll out the security-feature-enablement rule to the plurality of client systems.

17. The system of claim 16, wherein the server module is further programmed to:

determine that the security-feature-enablement rule did not negatively impact the health of the legacy application;

initiate a staged roll-out of the security-feature-enablement rule to the plurality of client systems.

18. The system of claim 17, wherein the server module is further programmed to:

receive, from at least one additional client system within the plurality of client systems, health-impact information for the security-feature-enablement rule;

determine that the security-feature-enablement rule negatively impacted the health of a legacy application on the additional client system;

abort the staged roll-out of the security-feature-enablement rule.

19. The method of claim 17, wherein the staged roll-out comprises increasing distribution of the security-feature-enablement rule by increments in multiple stages until the distribution encompasses the plurality of client systems.

20. The system of claim 15, wherein the security-feature-enablement rule comprises a particular combination of security-feature-enablement rules.