System Identification for Vulnerability Assessment

An independent method of taking an inventory of the devices currently attached to your network must be developed in order to adequately secure the entire network. You must know what you are defending to adequately defend it. This paper is a description of one company's journey using existing software utilities to identify the hardware and software that placed their network at risk. The writer says: 'I am hopeful that the tools and ideas used here will help others construct a suite of tools that suits their needs and will save them some of the headaches and redesign time we have spent. We did not have a clear vision of the end product when we started by publishing our journey I hope to save others some of that pain.