Publications
Hardware foundation for secure computing
Summary
Summary
Software security solutions are often considered to be more adaptable than their hardware counterparts. However, software has to work within the limitations of the system hardware platform, of which the selection is often dictated by functionality rather than security. Performance issues of security solutions without proper hardware support are easy...
Security Design of Mission-Critical Embedded Systems
Summary
Summary
This tutorial explains a systematic approach of co-designing functionality and security into mission-criticalembedded systems. The tutorial starts by reviewing common issues in embedded applications to define mission objectives,threat models, and security/resilience goals. We then introduce an overview of security technologies toachieve goals of confidentiality, integrity, and availability given design criteria...
Guest editorial: special issue on hardware solutions for cyber security
Summary
Summary
A cyber system could be viewed as an architecture consisting of application software, system software, and system hardware. The hardware layer, being at the foundation of the overall architecture, must be secure itself and also provide effective security features to the software layers. In order to seamlessly integrate security hardware...
Design and analysis framework for trusted and assured microelectronics
Summary
Summary
An in-depth understanding of microelectronics assurance in Department of Defense (DoD) missions is increasingly important as the DoD continues to address supply chain challenges. Many studies take a "bottom-up" approach, in which vulnerabilities are assessed in terms of general-purpose usage. This is beneficial in developing a general knowledge foundation. However...
HARDEN: A high assurance design environment
Summary
Summary
Systems resilient to cyber-attacks for mission assurance are difficult to develop, and the means of effectively evaluating them is even harder. We have developed a new architectural design and engineering environment, referred to as HARDEN (High AssuRance Design ENvironment), which supports an agile design methodology used to create secure and...
OS independent and hardware-assisted insider threat detection and prevention framework
Summary
Summary
Governmental and military institutions harbor critical infrastructure and highly confidential information. Although institutions are investing a lot for protecting their data and assets from possible outsider attacks, insiders are still a distrustful source of information leakage. As malicious software injection is one among many attacks, turning innocent employees into malicious...
Designing secure and resilient embedded avionics systems
Summary
Summary
With an increased reliance on Unmanned Aerial Systems (UAS) as mission assets and the dependency of UAS on cyber resources, cyber security of UAS must be improved by adopting sound security principles and relevant technologies from the computing community. On the other hand, the traditional avionics community, being aware of...
Functionality and security co-design environment for embedded systems
Summary
Summary
For decades, embedded systems, ranging from intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance (ISR) sensors to electronic warfare and electronic signal intelligence systems, have been an integral part of U.S. Department of Defense (DoD) mission systems. These embedded systems are increasingly the targets of deliberate and sophisticated attacks. Developers thus need to focus...
Mission assurance: beyond secure processing
Summary
Summary
The processor of a drone runs essential functions of sensing, communications, coordination, and control. This is the conventional view. But in today's cyber environment, the processor must also provide security to assure mission completion. We have been developing a secure processing architecture for mission assurance. A study on state-of-the-art secure...
Next-generation embedded processors: an update
Summary
Summary
For mission assurance, Department of Defense (DoD) embedded systems should be designed to mitigate various aspects of cyber risks, while maintaining performance (size, weight, power, cost, and schedule). This paper reports our latest research effort in the development of a next-generation System-on-Chip (SoC) for DoD applications, which we first presented...