Patterns and Interactions in Network Security

TL;DR

This paper provides a comprehensive overview of network security patterns, categorizing mechanisms into four main types and discussing their interactions, aimed at both security and networking professionals.

Contribution

It introduces a unified classification of network security mechanisms based on recurring patterns and explores their interactions within network systems.

Findings

Identifies four core security patterns in networks.

Highlights the importance of pattern interactions in security.

Provides a pragmatic classification of security attacks.

Abstract

Networks play a central role in cyber-security: networks deliver security attacks, suffer from them, defend against them, and sometimes even cause them. This article is a concise tutorial on the large subject of networks and security, written for all those interested in networking, whether their specialty is security or not. To achieve this goal, we derive our focus and organization from two perspectives. The first perspective is that, although mechanisms for network security are extremely diverse, they are all instances of a few patterns. Consequently, after a pragmatic classification of security attacks, the main sections of the tutorial cover the four patterns for providing network security, of which the familiar three are cryptographic protocols, packet filtering, and dynamic resource allocation. Although cryptographic protocols hide the data contents of packets, they cannot hide packet headers. When users need to hide packet headers from adversaries, which may include the network from which they are receiving service, they must resort to the pattern of compound sessions and overlays. The second perspective comes from the observation that security mechanisms interact in important ways, with each other and with other aspects of networking, so each pattern includes a discussion of its interactions.