6th CACR Information Security Workshop
1st Annual Privacy and Security Workshop

Speaker
Mike Knowles, IBM

Moderator's Bio
Michael Knowles is a security architect with IBM's Global IT Security and Privacy Services and has been working in the services organization for the last 5 years. He has extensive work experience and in-depth knowledge in integrating and managing PKI Infrastructures and also has a strong expertise in Local Area Networks and in Personal Computers. With deep working knowledge in Token Ring, Ethernet, Netscape Enterprise Server, Network Dispatcher, HACMP, TCP/IP, AIX, OS/2, DOS/Windows, and OS/2 LAN Server,
Mr. Knowles has assisted customers in government, banking, education, financial, health care, and retail industries with their e-Business concerns.

Created an Enterprise Information and Information Technology Security Architecture for a government ministry. This work comprised of assessing and creating security principles, performing a gap analysis for existing security policies, creating conceptual and logical security architectures, and assisting with the creation of security selection criteria and security standards. This work was integrated into an information repository as a base for future projects throughout the ministries of the government.

Mr. Knowles assessed the firewall rules for a government ministry. After the assessment, the firewall was upgraded and the revised and corrected rules were implemented. A platform assessment was performed last with the outcome of the project a conclusion to re-architect the firewall infrastructure in which Mr. Knowles will perform and implement.

Mr. Knowles performed a high level assessment of network security and overall security policy and practice against BS 7799 (British Standard 7799 is a commercial security standard for business) for a major services company. The project outlined some immediate concerns for the company to address and Mr. Knowles will perform penetration testing in a later phase of this project.

Mr. Knowles performed a high-level security assessment of a PeopleSoft application to determine any security exposures that may exist for the customer. The assessment considered various areas such as application, network, operating system, database, support and corporate policies as well as a comparison to best practices in the industry.

Mr. Knowles architected a solution for a hospital's doctors to securely access the internal network from remote sites. This solution when implemented will allow these remote doctors to instantly access medical information from the hospital.

Mr. Knowles integrated an existing Internet Banking application with the Entrust PKI Infrastructure. This integration required an understanding of the PKI mechanics. Working closely with the associate's Security Department, a solid solution developed encompassing customer registration, authentication, session management, and support. The end solution included hardening all servers to prevent unauthorized access, assessing any risk associated with the solution, and documenting the integrated PKI infrastructure with regards to the Internet Banking Application.

Mr. Knowles enhanced a customer's Internet application for high availability. By incorporating Network Dispatchers, the Internet traffic was balanced between multiple Web Servers. HACMP was used for the Application Servers to ensure the Internet application would be available 24 hours each day for seven days a week. The application itself was made more intelligent to improve response time within the environment.

Mr. Knowles wrote a CGI script and created HTML pages for an e-Business application. He also setup and configuration two RS/6000's with AIX and all other required software. Mr. Knowles assisted with the development of an Internet Security document for this solution. This application now serves over fifty thousand of this financial institution's customers.

Mr. Knowles instructed a course on the installation and some of the applications of TCP/IP. The applications included FTP, Telnet, and WebExplorer. The instruction consisted of demonstrations followed by group labs which were created by Mr. Knowles.

Michael Knowles acquired his "Bachelors of Mathematics - Honours Computer Science - Philosophy Minor - Co-op" degree from the University of Waterloo.