Threat Modelling

What is Threat Modelling?
Threat modeling is a procedure for optimizing Network/ Application/ Internet Security by

identifying objectives and vulnerabilities, and then defining countermeasures to prevent, or
mitigate the effects of, threats to the system. A threat is a potential or actual undesirable event
that may be malicious (such as DoS attack) or incidental (failure of a Storage Device). Threat
modeling is a planned activity for identifying and assessing application threats and
vulnerabilities.
Threat modeling has two distinct, but related meanings in computer world:
The first is a description of the security issues the designer cares about. This is the sense
of the question, "What is the threat model for DNSSec?"
In the second sense, Threat modeling is synonymous with the development of attack
trees, which are descriptions of a set of computer security aspects. That is, when looking at a
piece of software (or any computer system), one can define a threat model by defining a set
of possible attacks to consider.
Use of Threat Model:

A threat model can help to assess the probability, the potential harm, the priority etc., of
attacks, and thus help to minimize or eradicate the threats. More recently, threat
modeling has become an integral part of Microsoft's SDL (Security Development
Lifecycle) process.
Threat Modeling Approach:
General high level overviews of common steps in the defensive perspective threat modeling are:
Figure 1: Threat Modeling Steps

Define the application requirements:
To identifying the application requirements is the first step when we going towards the
development of threat model for any particular organization. Every organization has some
confidential data, from salaries to Social Security numbers. We cannot have idea what hackers
want until we've identified the sensitive information in our organization.
Model the application architecture:
To create overview of organizational architecture is the second step. We have to clear about for
what purpose the system is designed (like use cases of system), how can we develop the
architecture and design of our system(like architectural model of system) that it will function
efficiently and what technologies are required to implement the design. The deep knowledge
about the systems architecture provides help to identify common technology-specific threats and
implement solutions to overcome them.
Identify any threats:
In the fourth step, we have to identify threats that might affect our system and compromise our
systems assets. We have to take a thorough examine of all modules from all aspects to check the
vulnerabilities or loop holes that can cause a threat in future for the system. The best way to go
deep with the systems application is to use attack trees, which define a potential attack on your
system in a structured and hierarchical manner.
Assign risk values and determine the risk responses:
Here in this step we have to do assessments about different kinds of threats that can affect the
system in different nature some may be more dreadful in nature and could cause major loss of
organizations assets, or some may be frequently occur, some treats are accidental, or some may
be intentional etc. so, we have to adopt careful approach to identifying the risks. A common
approach for risk assessment is DREAD uses by Microsoft.
Determine the Countermeasures for Risk responses:
Determine the countermeasures to implement based on your chosen risk responses. We should
document each threat, the description of the threat, the target of the attack, the risk of the attack,
the techniques likely to be used to perform the attack, and a strategy to manage risks that might
be faced by the system.
Update the threat model:
Continually update the threat model based on the emerging security landscape. In-fact Threat
modeling provides a clear "line of sight" across a project that justifies security efforts. The threat
model allows security decisions to be made rationally, with all the information on the table. The
threat modeling process naturally produces an assurance argument that can be used to explain
and defend the security of an application.

Threat Modelling

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What is Threat Modelling?

Threat modeling is a procedure for optimizing Network/ Application/ Internet Security by

Use of Threat Model:

Figure 1: Threat Modeling Steps

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