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Shadow Networks an Unintended IPv6 Side Effect

Posted by Robert Mullins
April 05, 2012

Nonetheless, Narus warned of the security vulnerability, too, when it introduced the latest version of its traffic monitoring tool, NarusInsight8, in March; like Blue Coat’s offering, it supports IPv6 so it can see shadow networks.

“Most of today's security solutions operate using IPv4 and are unable to correctly parse and identify IPv6 connections. Cybercriminals seize on this lapse in visibility, creating IPv6 connections that are ignored by security solutions,” the company states.

The shadow network issue may be getting more attention because of greater attention to the adoption of IPv6 generally, adds Greg Oslan, the Narus CEO.

Narus touted its support for IPv6 support and 10 Gigabit Ethernet -- another new standard for networking equipment -- in the Insight8 release. It also promoted a new feature to improve “hardening” of networks from external attacks. The new features support recommended standards of the U.S. National Institute of Standards & Technology (NIST).

While the IPv6 shadow network problem needs to be dealt with, there are still other network security worries as IPv6 adoption grows, says Oslan.

IPv4 was replaced by IPv6 because the world was quickly running out of IPv4 addresses. But the flip side of having trillions upon trillions of IPv6 address to connect servers, computers, smartphones, refrigerators, cars, home energy monitors and the like, is keeping track of them all, he says.

“Take IPv6, cloud and virtualization, all happening at similar times, and you start to lose visibility into the end points and that, today, is where most security occurs,” Oslan says. “So when you lose the visibility to the end points, security starts to fall apart.”

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