Evaluating Security Devices (ASWEC industry talk)

Speaker: Luke Wildman

When: 10:00, Friday, 4 March 2005

Venue: 78-420

Electronic communications devices safeguard classified information in government and military networks. In particular, domain separation devices allow the flow of information between high and low-security domains to be controlled. Examples of such devices include data diodes, multi-computer switches, context filters and cryptographic devices.

Electronic communications devices intended for government or military applications must be rigorously evaluated to ensure that they maintain data confidentiality. High-grade information security evaluations require a detailed analysis of the device's design, to determine how it achieves necessary security functions. In practice, such evaluations are labour-intensive and costly, so there is a strong incentive to find ways to make the process more efficient.

High-grade information security devices must also preserve security properties in the presence of faults. This in turn requires a rigorous evaluation of the system behaviours resulting from component failures, especially how such failures affect information flow. Indeed, evaluating the fault behaviour of a device is extremely challenging. Not only must the consequences of every possible failure of every component within the device be examined, but consideration must be given to the consequences of simultaneous complicit faults, involving several components. Furthermore, component faults may be independent, as per the failure modes of specific pieces of equipment, or related, due to some overall design flaw.

In this presentation I will discuss practical techniques developed in collaboration with the Defence Signals Directorate (DSD) for security device evaluation. First, I will show how the evaluation process can be made more efficient, by prioritising the components to be studied. Second, I will show how to verify the security of the device in the presence of faults. The concepts are illustrated through a small case study involving evaluation of a cryptographic device for potential breaches of (overt) data confidentiality.

This research is funded by the Defence Signals Directorate and the Australian Research Council via Linkage-Projects Grant LP0347620, Formally-Based Security Evaluation Procedures.

Hospitality: Tim McComb

Contact: Phil Cook (SSE seminar co-ordinator) (philc@itee.uq.edu.au)

SSE seminar web page: http://www.itee.uq.edu.au/~sse/Seminars.html