Collecting up Validator Security Resources

[maurelian]

I’m interested in learning more about best practices in validator security, and would like to use this thread to source existing content on the topic.

Here are a few relevant conversations from the forum:

This looks like the best roundup up of info from different validators about their infrastructure and ops:

Full disclosure: Let's publish validator operations & infrastructure info

Full disclosure on Figment Networks’ Cosmos validator infrastructure and operations: https://twitter.com/FigmentNetworks/status/1136000871463104512 Let’s get about how to make staking on Cosmos as secure as possible, and let’s be open for delegators to make informed decisions. Spread the word: more transparency and a stronger, more secure Cosmos network Medium article here

Here are some other good conversations:

Sentry Node Architecture Overview

Overview The Sentry Node Architecture (referred to as SNA in this document) is an infrastructure example for DDoS mitigation on Gaia / Cosmos Hub network validator nodes. Disclaimer It is important to understand that this is only one example of solving DDoS mitigation for validator nodes. For diversity in the network, validators are encouraged to implement their own solutions. Each validator is responsible for their own solution. This example might be missing crucial security features that need…

Validator Risk Treatments / Security Controls

As a follow-up to the Risk Assessment posted a couple weeks ago, we now have posted a document covering the recommended Risk Treatments for Cosmos Hub / Tendermint Validators. Full disclosure: the document makes a plug for our services, but I tried to minimize it and have something that would stand on its own as useful to the community. Between it and the risk assessment there are some outstanding questions – I’ll address those in their own topics though. Any feedback welcome here or on that pag…

Backing up Validator Server (Physical Data Center)

Redundancy of Validator Server (Physical Datacenter) Security and maintenance have been mentioned multiple times among validators, since it plays a critical role in safe operation of validator nodes within the network. While considering multiple security structures, such as the article “Sentry Node Architecture”, our team has come to an issue of making a backup for Validator server as one of crucial issue. Documentation of the Cosmos Network recommends that validators keep their Validator nod…

Valid validator set without DDoS

How does Tendermint maintain a persistent public key record of nodes without exposing them to DDoS attacks?

Validator Node Compromize Analysis

We are currently evaluating the KMS softsign component for production use. Softsign has some good properties compared to a HSM. However, some risk analysis is required beforehand. Assumptions Let’s assume we have a sentry architecture with a KMS component, an adversary has taken over the validator node, and that the operator key is completely offline and not accessible by the attacker. Implications The adversary is able to send arbitrary commands to the KMS; e.g. SignVote, SignProposal and…

Some nice guides I found elsewhere:

https://bubowerks.io/blog/2018/08/27/risk-treatments-for-cosmos-hub-tendermint-validator-risks/

https://bubowerks.io/blog/2018/08/03/risk-assessment-of-cosmos-tendermint-validators/

On Validator Setup - 01node

I’m curious what resources others have found useful, even if they may not be specific to Cosmos, or even POS validation in particular.

Is there any form of content/guidelines missing that validators are looking for?

[michaelng]

We have 1 on setting HSM policies if that counts: http://bit.ly/HSMpolicies