Granted Patent B2

US 8,091,117 · App. 10/778,779 · Granted Jan 3, 2012

Abstract

Claims (58)

1. A method comprising:

communicating with a plurality of heterogeneous information sources;

converting received network information into a normalized data format written in a mark-up language;

comparing at least a portion of the converted network information with a network policy;

determining, based on the comparison, compliance with the network policy; and

recommending rules for improving the network policy;

wherein the received network information is normalized for structure utilizing a conversion table that maps known fields of the received network information into fields used in the normalized data format;

wherein the rules are recommended via an ordered list, the ordered list ordering the rules based on a number of times each of the rules was previously applied, a severity meter set for each of the rules, or assets affected by each of the rules, wherein the network information includes a list of wireless access point devices and associated parameters used for accessing one or more wireless networks, and wherein a location for each of the wireless access points is determined.

2. The method of claim 1 , wherein the comparing further comprises:

identifying whether a first converted network information associated with a first information source is semantically equivalent to a second converted network information associated with a second information source.

3. The method of claim 1 further comprising:

tracking an identity of a network device; and

correlating the gathered network information based on the tracked identity of the network device.

4. The method of claim 1 further comprising:

scheduling a network audit for gathering the network information; and

dynamically configuring a packet filter for opening communication with a network device in response to a start of the scheduled network audit, and closing communication with the network device in response to an end of the scheduled network audit.

5. The method of claim 1 , further comprising:

making an association with a particular wireless access point.

6. The method of claim 5 , wherein the determining of the location of the particular wireless access point comprises:

identifying one or more routers associated with the particular wireless access point; and

associating the identified routers with the particular wireless access point parameters.

7. The method of claim 6 , wherein the identifying of the one or more routers comprises tracing a route of a packet transmitted via the routers.

8. A system, comprising:

a first server coupled to a plurality of heterogeneous information sources, the first server including:

means for facilitating communication with the plurality of heterogeneous information sources; and

means for converting the information gathered by the heterogeneous information sources into a normalized data format written in a mark-up language;

and

a recommendation engine for recommending rules for improving the network policy;

wherein the information is normalized for structure utilizing a conversion table that maps known fields of the information into fields used in the normalized data format;

wherein the rules are recommended via an ordered list, the ordered list ordering the rules based on a number of times each of the rules was previously applied, a severity meter set for each of the rules, or assets affected by each of the rules, wherein the network information includes a list of wireless access point devices and associated parameters used for accessing one or more wireless networks, and wherein a location for each of the wireless access points is determined.

9. The system of claim 8 further comprising:

means for comparing at least a portion of the converted information with a network policy.

10. The system of claim 8 further comprising:

means for identifying whether a first converted network information associated with a first information source is semantically equivalent to a second converted network information associated with a second information source.

11. The system of claim 8 further comprising:

means for tracking an identity of a network device; and

means for correlating the gathered network information based on the tracked identity of the network device.

12. The system of claim 8 further comprising:

means for scheduling a network audit for gathering the network information; and

means for dynamically configuring a packet filter for opening communication with a network device in response to a start of the scheduled network audit, and closing communication with the network device in response to an end of the scheduled network audit.

13. The system of claim 8 , the system further comprising:

means for making an association with a particular wireless access point.

14. The system of claim 13 , wherein the means for determining the location of the particular wireless access point comprises:

means for identifying one or more routers associated with the particular wireless access point; and

means for associating the identified routers with the particular wireless access point parameters.

15. A computer program product embodied on a tangible non-transitory computer readable medium, comprising:

computer code for receiving network information gathered by a heterogeneous information sources via the uniform communications interface;

computer code for converting the received network information into a normalized data format taking the form of a mark-up language;

computer code for comparing at least a portion of the converted network information with a network policy;

computer code for determining, based on the comparison, compliance with the network policy; and

computer code for recommending rules for improving the network policy;

wherein the received network information is normalized for structure utilizing a conversion table that maps known fields of the received network information into fields used in the normalized data format;

wherein the rules are recommended via an ordered list, the ordered list ordering the rules based on a number of times each of the rules was previously applied, a severity meter set for each of the rules, or assets affected by each of the rules, wherein the network information includes a list of wireless access point devices and associated parameters used for accessing one or more wireless networks, and wherein a location for each of the wireless access points is determined.

16. The method of claim 1 , wherein the mark-up language includes an extensible mark-up language (XML).

17. The method of claim 5 , wherein the associated parameters include at least one of an identifier, a radio frequency, a channel, and an encryption status associated with the particular wireless access point device.

18. The method of claim 1 , wherein at least one of the assets includes a particular wireless access point, and the rules are recommended in response to a determination that the network policy excludes rules for the particular wireless access point.

19. The method of claim 1 , wherein the rules are written for specific device types, specific application configurations, and specific subnets and further include rules that seek to find violations of network policies, rules that seek to gather the information about the network, rules that seek to identify compromised hosts, and rules that seek to identify vulnerabilities in the network.

20. The method of claim 1 , wherein the reference map includes a reference field and at least one data source field, the reference field including a list of references mapped to corresponding test IDs and keywords produced by data source products identified in the at least one data source field, and each test ID and keyword associated with a particular data source product is deemed semantically equivalent to at least one other test ID and keyword associated with another data source product when the test ID and keyword and the at least one other test ID and keyword are associated with the same reference.

Assignments (19)