Windows Server 2003 security performance needs to be improved

Many users will have questions, from the installation of the system to the security protection do it yourself, isn't it enough? Of course it is not enough, in addition to hands-on to do the right method . If you have ever configured Windows NT Server or Windows 2000 Server, you may find that these Microsoft products are not the safest by default. Although Microsoft provides a lot of security mechanisms, you still need to implement them. However, when Microsoft released Windows Server 2003, it changed the previous philosophy. The new idea is that the server should be secure by default. This is indeed a good idea, but Microsoft has not implemented it thoroughly enough. Although the default Windows 2003 installation is definitely much safer than the Windows NT or Windows 2000 installation, there are still some shortcomings. Let's discuss how to make Windows Server 2003 more secure.

Understanding Your Roles

Understanding server roles is an indispensable step in the security process. Windows Server can be configured into multiple roles. Windows Server 2003 can be used as a domain controller, member server, infrastructure server, file server, print server, IIS server, IAS server, terminal server, and so on. A server can even be configured as a combination of the above roles.

The problem now is that each server role has corresponding security requirements. For example, if your server will act as an IIS server, then you will need to turn on the IIS service. However, if the server will act as a standalone file or print server, enabling IIS services can be a huge security risk.

The reason I talked about this here is that I can't give you a set of steps that work in every situation. Server security should change as server roles and server environments change.

Because there are many ways to enhance the server, I will discuss the feasibility of configuring server security by configuring a simple but secure file server as an example. I will try to point out what you will do when the server role changes. Please understand that this is not a complete guide covering every role server.

Physical Security

In order to achieve true security, your server must be placed in a secure location. Typically, this means that the server will be placed behind the locked door. Physical security is quite important because many of the existing management and disaster recovery tools are also available to hackers. Anyone with such a tool can attack the server while physically accessing the server. The only way to avoid this type of attack is to place the server in a secure location. This is necessary for any role in Windows Server 2003.

Creating a Baseline

In addition to building good physical security, the best advice I can give you is to determine your security requirements strategy when configuring a range of Windows Server 2003. And deploy and implement these policies immediately.

The best way to do this is to create a security baseline. A security baseline is a list of documents and recognized security settings. In most cases, your baseline will vary depending on the server role. So you'd better create a few different baselines to apply them to different types of servers. For example, you can set a baseline for the file server, another baseline for the domain controller, and a baseline for the IAS server that is different from the previous two.

Windows 2003 includes a tool called "Security Configuration & Analysis". This tool allows you to compare the server's current security policy to the baseline security policy in the template file. You can create these templates yourself or use the built-in security templates.

Security templates are a series of text-based INF files that are saved in %SYSTEMROOT%\\SECURITY| Under the TEMPLATES folder. The easiest way to check or change these individual templates is to use the Management Console (MMC).

To open this console, enter the MMC command at the RUN prompt. After the console loads, select the Add/Remove Snap-in Properties command and Windows will display the Add/Remove Snap-in list. Click the "Add" button and you will see a list of all available snap-ins. Select the Security Templates snap-in, then click Add, then click the Close and Confirm buttons.

After the Security Templates snap-in is loaded, you can view each security template. As you traverse the console tree, you'll find that each template mimics the structure of Group Policy. The template name reflects the purpose of each template. For example, the HISECDC template is a highly secure domain controller template.