Software

This project explores approaches to attack and defend the lifespan of flash storage in small mobile devices. While the project focuses on smartphones, the research is applicable to any small flash-based device that allows users to install applications, including smart watches, Internet-of-Things (IoT) devices, computerized medical equipment, and computer-managed critical infrastructure. It is well understood that, over time, writing to flash storage will physically wear out the device. This problem is considered a nonissue with respect to enterprise Solid State Drives (SSDs).

Cybersecurity is one of the most strategically important areas in computer science, and also one of the most difficult disciplines to teach effectively. Historically, hands-on cyber security exercises helped students reinforce basic concepts, but most of them focused on user level attacks and defenses. Since OS kernels provide the foundations to the applications, any compromise to OS kernels will lead to an entirely untrusted computing. Therefore, it is imperative to teach students the practice of kernel level attacks and defenses.

This capacity building project will create Secure Programming Clinic to enhance student learning and expertise in writing robust, secure software, analogous to a writing clinic in an English department or law school. It provides continual reinforcement of the mechanisms, methods, technologies, and need for programming with security and robustness considerations throughout a student's undergraduate coursework. The clinic would augment courses, not replace them or their content.

Current cloud computing platforms, mobile computing devices, and embedded devices all have the security weakness that they permit information flows that violate the confidentiality or integrity of information. This project explores an integrated approach in which software and hardware are co-designed with strong, comprehensive, verifiable security assurance. The goal is to develop a methodology for designing systems in which all forms of information flow are tracked, at both the hardware and software levels, and between these levels.

This project provides support for a National Academies Roundtable, the Forum on Cyber Resilience. The Forum will facilitate and enhance the exchange of ideas among scientists, practitioners, and policy makers concerned with the resilience of computing and communications systems, including the Internet, critical infrastructure, and other societally important systems.