Adaptive Profiles

The following topics describe how to configure adaptive profiles:

About Adaptive Profiles

Adaptive profiles must be enabled in order to:

  • Perform application and file control, including malware protection (AMP), and to allow intrusion rules to use service metadata.


    Caution
    Adaptive profiling must be enabled (its default state) as described in Configuring Adaptive Profiles for access control rules to perform application and file control, including malware protection (AMP), and for intrusion rules to use service metadata.

  • For passive deployments, enable adaptive profile updates to defragment and reassemble IP traffic according to the destination hosts' operating systems.


    Note
    For inline deployments Cisco recommends that, instead of enabling adaptive profile updates, you configure the inline normalization preprocessor with the Normalize TCP Payload option enabled.

License Requirements for Adaptive Profiles

Threat Defense License

IPS

Requirements and Prerequisites for Adaptive Profiles

Model Support

Any.

Supported Domains

Any

User Roles

  • Admin

  • Access Admin

  • Network Admin

Adaptive Profile Updates

Typically, the system uses the static settings in your network analysis policy to preprocess and analyze traffic. With adaptive profile updates, the system can adapt processing behavior using host information either detected by network discovery or imported from a third party.

Profile updates, like the target-based profiles you can configure manually in a network analysis policy, help to defragment IP packets and reassemble streams in the same way as the operating system on the target host. The intrusion rules engine then analyzes the data in the same format as that used by the destination host.

Manually configured target-based profiles apply either the default operating system profile you select, or profiles you bind to specific hosts. Profile updates, however, switch to the appropriate operating system profile based on the operating system in the host profile for the target host.

Consider a scenario where you configure profile updates for the 10.6.0.0/16 subnet and set the default IP Defragmentation target-based policy to Linux. The management center where you configure the settings has a network map that includes the 10.6.0.0/16 subnet.

  • When the system detects traffic from Host A, which is not in the 10.6.0.0/16 subnet, it uses the Linux target-based policy to reassemble IP fragments.

  • When the system detects traffic from Host B, which is in the 10.6.0.0/16 subnet, it retrieves Host B’s operating system data from the network map. The system uses a profile based on that operating system to defragment the traffic destined for Host B.

Adaptive Profile Updates and Cisco Recommended Rules

The adaptive profile updates feature is an advanced setting in an access control policy that applies globally to all intrusion policies invoked by that access control policy. The Cisco recommended rules feature applies to the individual intrusion policy where you configure it.

Like Cisco recommended rules, profile updates compare metadata in a rule to host information to determine whether a rule should apply for a particular host. However, while Cisco recommended rules provide recommendations for enabling or disabling rules using that information, profile updates use the information to apply specific rules to specific traffic.

Cisco recommended rules require your interaction to implement suggested changes to rule states. Profile updates, on the other hand, do not modify intrusion policies. Treatment of rules based on profile updates happens on a packet-by-packet basis.

Additionally, Cisco recommended rules can result in enabling disabled rules. Profile updates, in contrast, only affect the application of rules that are already enabled in intrusion policies. Profile updates never change the rule state.

You can use profile updates and Cisco recommended rules in combination. Profile updates use the rule state for a rule when your intrusion policy is deployed to determine whether to include it as a candidate for applying, and your choices to accept or decline recommendations are reflected in that rule state. You can use both features to ensure that you have enabled or disabled the most appropriate rules for each network you monitor, and then to apply enabled rules most efficiently for specific traffic.

Adaptive Profile Options

Enable

Enabling this option is required for:

  • access control rules to perform application and file control, including malware protection (AMP)

  • intrusion rules to use service metadata

This option is enabled by default.


Note

To enable Adaptive Profiles in Snort 3, both Enable and Enable Profile Updates options must be selected.

Enable Profile Updates

In passive deployments, enable profile updates to defragment and reassemble IP traffic according to a profile of the operating system used by the hosts in your network map

For Snort 3, this must be enabled if Adaptive Profiles is enabled.

Adaptive Profiles - Attribute Update Interval

When profile updates are enabled, you can control how frequently in minutes network map data is synced from the management center to its managed devices. The system uses the data to determine what profiles should be used when processing traffic. Increasing the value for this option can improve performance in a large network.

Adaptive Profiles - Networks

Optionally, when profile updates are enabled, you can improve performance by constraining profile updates to a comma-separated list of IP addresses, address blocks, and network variables. If you use a network variable, the system uses the variable's value in the variable set linked to the default intrusion policy for your access control policy. For example, you could enter: 192.168.1.101, 192.168.4.0/24, $HOME_NET. IPv4 and IPv6 are supported.

The default value (0.0.0.0/0) applies adaptive profile updates to all networks.

Configuring Adaptive Profiles

In a passive deployment, Cisco recommends that you configure adaptive profile updates. In an inline deployment, configure the inline normalization preprocessor with the Normalize TCP Payload option enabled.


Caution

Adaptive profiling must be enabled (its default state) as described in this procedure for access control rules to perform application or file control, including AMP, and for intrusion rules to use service metadata.

Before you begin

The access control policy must have a network discovery policy that is enabled to do host/service discovery, or host data must be imported from a third-party source.

Procedure

Step 1

In the access control policy editor, click Edit (edit icon) on the policy you want to modify.

Step 2

Click More > Advanced Settings, and then click Edit (edit icon) next to the Detection Enhancement Settings section.

If View (View button) appears instead, settings are inherited from an ancestor policy, or you do not have permission to modify the settings.If the configuration is unlocked, uncheck Inherit from base policy to enable editing.

Step 3

Set adaptive profile options as described in Adaptive Profile Options.

Step 4

Click OK.

Step 5

Click Save to save the policy.

What to do next