Setting Up and Hardening Windows DNS/AD for Southeastern Collegiate Cyber Defense Competition

Abstract

This proposal presents an adequate guideline for setting up, hardening and controlling Domain Name System server and Active Directory on a Windows machine. The research is going to focus on preparing the environment for the Collegiate Cyber Defense Competition. The first part of the preparation includes an explanation of what CCDC is, and the different levels of the competition. The second part contains information about various kinds of servers and machines are used at the CCDC. Later, a paragraph about DNS/AD follows. Next, the paper focuses on specific Windows server types that can be used for DNS/AD in the actual competition.  When the reader gets general information about Collegiate Cyber Defense Competition, Domain Name System/Active Directory, and Windows servers, the paper switches to the actual installation of a Windows server on a virtual machine. We will setup the environment that is going to be very close to what is set in CCDC. After the basic preparation, the main parts of the research follow: hardening the server and controlling it. The instructions and information provided include an explanation and purpose of every program needed to control the server, changing security policies that users must follow, and the steps to harden the system. When the system is strong enough, we will focus on what types of tasks can be given at the contest, and how to implement them correctly.  Finally, the paper will summarize the entire analysis and show the parts of the system that can be improved.