Summary

In today's environment, computer networks are vulnerable to threats from both inside and outside an organization. Firewall systems log session information about selected incoming and outgoing transmission control protocol/Internet protocol (TCP/IP) connections.

However, those systems that are currently available are not generally interoperable because each system has its own special functionality, control mechanisms and session log formats.

The need most security administrators face today is the maintenance of a consistent session information exchange format across diverse firewall systems and even varied infrastructures.

Recommendation ITU-T X.1542 describes an information model for the session information message exchange format (SIMEF) and provides an associated data model specified with an extensible markup language (XML) schema. The SIMEF defines a data model representation for sharing transport layer session log information about centralized network security management and the security information exchange system. The specification of any transport protocol is beyond the scope of this Recommendation.