As a network administrator, auditor or architect, you know the importance of securing your network and finding security solutions you can implement quickly. This succinct book departs from other security literature by focusing exclusively on ways to secure Cisco routers, rather than the entire network. The rational is simple: If the router protecting a network is exposed to hackers, then so is the network behind it. Hardening Cisco Routers is a reference for protecting the protectors. Included are the following topics:

• The importance of router security and where routers fit into an overall security plan
• Different router configurations for various versions of Cisco?s IOS
• Standard ways to access a Cisco router and the security implications of each
• Password and privilege levels in Cisco routers
• Authentication, Authorization, and Accounting (AAA) control
• Router warning banner use (as recommended by the FBI)
• Unnecessary protocols and services commonly run on Cisco routers
• SNMP security
• Anti-spoofing
• Protocol security for RIP, OSPF, EIGRP, NTP, and BGP
• Logging violations
• Incident response
• Physical security

Written by Thomas Akin, an experienced Certified Information Systems Security Professional (CISSP) and Certified Cisco Academic Instructor (CCAI), the book is well organized, emphasizing practicality and a hands-on approach. At the end of each chapter, Akin includes a Checklist that summarizes the hardening techniques discussed in the chapter. The Checklists help you double-check the configurations you have been instructed to make, and serve as quick references for future security procedures.

Concise and to the point, Hardening Cisco Routers supplies you with all the tools necessary to turn a potential vulnerability into a strength. In an area that is otherwise poorly documented, this is the one book that will help you make your Cisco routers rock solid.

Average Customer Review: ( 16 customer reviews )
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This book is, pound for pound, among the best in my technical library.

Having almost no previous knowledge in router hardening (although I was aware of the basics of Cisco routers) a few hours with this book enabled me to review the "hardening" plan submitted by a highly paid security consultant, and provide useful comments on improving the proposal.

No doubt this book is the beginning, not the end, of my education on this subject. But this fine book got me off to a quick and productive start, which is high praise when compared to what could be said about so many other technical titles. Highly recommended.

8 of 8 found the following review helpful:

A GoldmineMay 24, 2002
By Edmund Bennett
This book is nothing short of a goldmine. I have read many infosec books, including plenty of Cisco security books, and this one packs twice as much quality information with twice as many topics in a tenth of the space. This one is cut in dry. The layout is perfect. The topic is stated, followed by the vulnerability and then the fix. A network admin's dream, without all of the filler.

5 of 5 found the following review helpful:

A TRUE Goldmine for Cisco adminsApr 04, 2002
By Jim Fraiser
This book is a huge *must* for anyone who works with Cisco routers. I got it because as a network admin I needed a checklist on securing our routers. Showed it to our InfoSec director and he ordered all our routers nationwide to be secured according to the book's checklists!

4 of 4 found the following review helpful:

Great compilation for hardening Cisco RoutersJul 20, 2002

Although the content of the book can be found in the Cisco web site, but why bother digging the web site for it?

Thomas Akin did a great job by providing all the basics (and more) that we should do to hardened Cisco Routers before putting it in a production network specially those routers providing internet access to users.

Danilo Castro Dy
MCP+I, MCSE, CCNP

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