Today Active Directory Security is mission-critical to organizational security worldwide and thus mission-critical to Cyber Security worldwide. On this blog, former Microsoft Program Manager for Active Directory Security, and today, CEO of Paramount Defenses, shares valuable technical insights on Active Directory Security.


Friday, September 28, 2018

A Few Notable Names in the Active Directory (AD) / AD Security Space

Folks,

Today I wanted to take a moment to share a few notable names in the Active Directory space, of those individuals who I feel have done a lot to help IT admins and IT personnel worldwide better understand Active Directory and Active Directory Security.

Oh, and for those wondering who I am to come up with such a list, I'm a nobody whose work however likely impacts everybody, and here's a very small sample of my work -
  1. AdminSDHolder
  2. Kerberos Token Bloat
  3. Mimikatz DCSync Mitigation
  4. Active Directory Privilege Escalation
  5. Active Directory Effective Permissions 
  6. Active Directory ACLs - Attack and Defense
  7. How to Discover Stealthy Admins in Active Directory
  8. How to Thwart Sneaky Persistence in Active Directory 
  9. How to Easily Solve the Difficult Problem of Active Directory Botnets
  10. and of course, the 30-day series on Active Directory Security School for Microsoft

BTW, in the next few days, you can expect much more, including What Constitutes a Privileged User in Active Directory, The Most Important Active Directory Security Capability, How to Make an Organization's Domain Admins Powerless in 2 Minutes, How to Actually Secure and Defend an Active Directory, Breach to 0wned in 5 Minutes, Defending Active Directory and more.

But this isn't about me, so lets keep reading.



A Few Notable Names in the Active Directory / Active Directory Security Space

Without further adieu, I'd like to take a moment to share a few notable names in the Active Directory / Active Directory Security space, as I feel that in the last 10 to 20 years, these individuals have done a lot to helps hundreds of thousands (if not millions) of IT admins and personnel worldwide, better understand various aspects of Active Directory and Active Directory Security.



So here's a list of a few notable folks in the Active Directory space, listed in no particular (i.e. random) order -

  1. Joe Richards - Joe is one of the most knowledgeable and experienced folks in the Active Directory space.

  2. Daniel Ulrichs - Daniel is one of the most knowledgeable and experienced folks in Active Directory Security.

  3. Christoffer Andersson - Christoffer, a longtime Directory MVP is very knowledgeable in Active Directory.

  4. Robbie Allen - Robbie needs no introduction in the space and is the author of multiple books on Active Directory. 

  5. Santhosh Sivarjan - Santhosh has been working on Active Directory for years and is very knowledgeable.

  6. Guido Grillemeier - Guido is amongst the most knowledgeable and finest Active Directory Security experts out there.

  7. Brian Desmond - Brian is a recognized Microsoft infrastructure expert with years of experience.

  8. Derek Seaman - Derek is a highly experienced Active Directory practioner, now focused on virtualization.

  9. Sander Berkouwer - Sander is a multiple-time Directory Services MVP and has been working on AD for years.

  10. John Craddock - John is an accomplished Microsoft MVP who has been working on AD since pre-Windows 2000.

  11. Alistair G. Lowe-Norris - Alistair too needs no introduction and is the author of several books on Active Directory. 

  12. Jorge de Almeida Pinto -  Jorge, a multiple time MVP, is a highly experienced Active Directory consultant/engineer.

  13. Brian Puhl - Brian is a highly experienced Active Directory Domain Admin, and is one of Microsoft IT's finest.

  14. Gil Kirkpatrick - Gil is one of the most recognized and experienced Active Directory experts out there.

  15. John Savill - John is a 11-time Microsoft MVP currently focused on Microsoft Azure.

  16. Ulf Simon-Weidner - Ulf is an 8-time MVP, an MCT, and has been working on Active Directory since Windows 2000.

  17. Sean Deuby - Sean is a highly experienced IT Architect and has been working on Active Directory since Windows 2000.

  18. Jimmy Andersson - Jimmy is a highly experienced AD expert, and has been awarded Microsoft MVP for 20 years now

  19. Mark Parris - Mark is an experienced AD consultant with almost two decades of experience on Active Directory 

  20. Jackson Shaw - Jackson is a longtime Active Directory veteran, who is very knowledgeable and well-known. 

In my opinion, the work, efforts and contributions of these individuals, whether it be in the form of sharing knowledge on blogs, answering questions on forums, providing feedback, presenting at conferences, or helping organizations directly, have likely helped millions of IT folks worldwide better understand various aspects of Active Directory and Active Directory security.

There are many more folks out there who have been working on Active Directory and Active Directory Security for years now, such as the hundreds of incredible folks who work for Microsoft Consulting Services, as well as other organizations in the Active Directory space such as Quest Software, HP Services and others, so if I may have unintentionally missed a few names I'm sorry. If you know of someone whose name you feel should be on this list, please leave me a comment below to let me know.

In addition, there are also a few notable new comers to the Active Directory / Active Directory Security space who have been working very hard and are making an impact, and this post wouldn't be complete without recognizing the new comers as well, so here they are (shared in random order) - Sean Metcalf, Andy Robbins, Will Schroeder and Lucas Bouillot to name a few.

Of course, I should also mention that in the list above, I haven't included my former Microsoft colleagues on the Active Directory Dev Team, because if I did so, the list would be long. Oddly enough, I think most of them may be working on Azure now ;-)


That's all for today. In the next two weeks, I'm going to answer this question to help Microsoft and organizations worldwide.

Best wishes,
Sanjay.

Monday, September 24, 2018

Pardon the Absence, and Get Ready!

Folks,

Hello again. I trust this finds you all doing well. It has been a few weeks since I last blogged. I hope you'll pardon my absence.

Yes I was supposed to answer a rather important question, in fact, possibly the world's most important cyber security question, for the whole world, back in July, but I had to postpone doing so, for a few good reasons, which I may reveal in days to come.

Let's just say that amongst other things (e.g. a rather interesting trip across the Atlantic), I was working on finalising a project that directly impacts cyber security worldwide today, you know, the kind of stuff that even James Bond doesn't have yet!



By the way, speaking of Mr. Bond, as you probably know, I'm a huge fan, so thought I'd share a catchy tune with you -



Oh, that project I was working is almost over (i.e. RC1), so its time for me to get back to blogging, and...     … well, get ready!

Best wishes,
Sanjay