Systems Support for Trusted Execution Environments

Cloud computing has become a default choice for data processing by both large corporations and individuals due to its economy of scale and ease of system management. However, the question of trust and trustoworthy computing inside the Cloud environments has been long neglected in practice and further exacerbated by the proliferation of AI and its use for processing of sensitive user data. Attempts to implement the mechanisms for trustworthy computing in the cloud have previously remained theoretical due to lack of hardware primitives in the commodity CPUs, while a combination of Secure Boot, TPMs, and virtualization has seen only limited adoption. The situation has changed in 2016, when Intel introduced the Software Guard Extensions (SGX) and its enclaves to the x86 ISA CPUs: for the first time, it became possible to build trustworthy applications relying on a commonly available technology. However, Intel SGX posed challenges to the practitioners who discovered the limitations of this technology, from the limited support of legacy applications and integration of SGX enclaves into the existing system, to the performance bottlenecks on communication, startup, and memory utilization. In this thesis, our goal is enable trustworthy computing in the cloud by relying on the imperfect SGX promitives. To this end, we develop and evaluate solutions to issues stemming from limited systems support of Intel SGX: we investigate the mechanisms for runtime support of POSIX applications with SCONE, an efficient SGX runtime library developed with performance limitations of SGX in mind. We further develop this topic with FFQ, which is a concurrent queue for SCONE's asynchronous system call interface. ShieldBox is our study of interplay of kernel bypass and trusted execution technologies for NFV, which also tackles the problem of low-latency clocks inside enclave. The two last systems, Clemmys and T-Lease are built on a more recent SGXv2 ISA extension. In Clemmys, SGXv2 allows us to significantly reduce the startup time of SGX-enabled functions inside a Function-as-a-Service platform. Finally, in T-Lease we solve the problem of trusted time by introducing a trusted lease primitive for distributed systems. We perform evaluation of all of these systems and prove that they can be practically utilized in existing systems with minimal overhead, and can be combined with both legacy systems and other SGX-based solutions. In the course of the thesis, we enable trusted computing for individual applications, high-performance network functions, and distributed computing framework, making a <vision of trusted cloud computing a reality

Secure Abstractions for Trusted Cloud Computation

Cloud computing is adopted by most organizations due to its characteristics, namely offering on-demand resources and services that can quickly be provisioned with minimal management effort and maintenance expenses for its users. However it still suffers from security incidents which have lead to many data security concerns and reluctance in further adherence. With the advent of these incidents, cryptographic technologies such as homomorphic and searchable encryption schemes were leveraged to provide solutions that mitigated data security concerns. The goal of this thesis is to provide a set of secure abstractions to serve as a tool for programmers to develop their own distributed applications. Furthermore, these abstractions can also be used to support trusted cloud computations in the context of NoSQL data stores. For this purpose we leveraged conflict-free replicated data types (CRDTs) as they provide a mechanism to ensure data consistency when replicated that has no need for synchronization, which aligns well with the distributed and replicated nature of the cloud, and the aforementioned cryptographic technologies to comply with the security requirements. The main challenge of this thesis consisted in combining the cryptographic technologies with the CRDTs in such way that it was possible to support all of the data structures functionalities over ciphertext while striving to attain the best security and performance possible. To evaluate our abstractions we conducted an experiment to compare each secure abstraction with their non secure counterpart performance wise. Additionally, we also analysed the security level provided by each of the structures in light of the cryptographic scheme used to support it. The results of our experiment shows that our abstractions provide the intended data security with an acceptable performance overhead, showing that it has potential to be used to build solutions for trusted cloud computation

Security and trust in cloud computing and IoT through applying obfuscation, diversification, and trusted computing technologies

Cloud computing and Internet of Things (IoT) are very widely spread and commonly used technologies nowadays. The advanced services offered by cloud computing have made it a highly demanded technology. Enterprises and businesses are more and more relying on the cloud to deliver services to their customers. The prevalent use of cloud means that more data is stored outside the organization’s premises, which raises concerns about the security and privacy of the stored and processed data. This highlights the significance of effective security practices to secure the cloud infrastructure. The number of IoT devices is growing rapidly and the technology is being employed in a wide range of sectors including smart healthcare, industry automation, and smart environments. These devices collect and exchange a great deal of information, some of which may contain critical and personal data of the users of the device. Hence, it is highly significant to protect the collected and shared data over the network; notwithstanding, the studies signify that attacks on these devices are increasing, while a high percentage of IoT devices lack proper security measures to protect the devices, the data, and the privacy of the users. In this dissertation, we study the security of cloud computing and IoT and propose software-based security approaches supported by the hardware-based technologies to provide robust measures for enhancing the security of these environments. To achieve this goal, we use obfuscation and diversification as the potential software security techniques. Code obfuscation protects the software from malicious reverse engineering and diversification mitigates the risk of large-scale exploits. We study trusted computing and Trusted Execution Environments (TEE) as the hardware-based security solutions. Trusted Platform Module (TPM) provides security and trust through a hardware root of trust, and assures the integrity of a platform. We also study Intel SGX which is a TEE solution that guarantees the integrity and confidentiality of the code and data loaded onto its protected container, enclave. More precisely, through obfuscation and diversification of the operating systems and APIs of the IoT devices, we secure them at the application level, and by obfuscation and diversification of the communication protocols, we protect the communication of data between them at the network level. For securing the cloud computing, we employ obfuscation and diversification techniques for securing the cloud computing software at the client-side. For an enhanced level of security, we employ hardware-based security solutions, TPM and SGX. These solutions, in addition to security, ensure layered trust in various layers from hardware to the application. As the result of this PhD research, this dissertation addresses a number of security risks targeting IoT and cloud computing through the delivered publications and presents a brief outlook on the future research directions.Pilvilaskenta ja esineiden internet ovat nykyään hyvin tavallisia ja laajasti sovellettuja tekniikkoja. Pilvilaskennan pitkälle kehittyneet palvelut ovat tehneet siitä hyvin kysytyn teknologian. Yritykset enenevässä määrin nojaavat pilviteknologiaan toteuttaessaan palveluita asiakkailleen. Vallitsevassa pilviteknologian soveltamistilanteessa yritykset ulkoistavat tietojensa käsittelyä yrityksen ulkopuolelle, minkä voidaan nähdä nostavan esiin huolia taltioitavan ja käsiteltävän tiedon turvallisuudesta ja yksityisyydestä. Tämä korostaa tehokkaiden turvallisuusratkaisujen merkitystä osana pilvi-infrastruktuurin turvaamista. Esineiden internet -laitteiden lukumäärä on nopeasti kasvanut. Teknologiana sitä sovelletaan laajasti monilla sektoreilla, kuten älykkäässä terveydenhuollossa, teollisuusautomaatiossa ja älytiloissa. Sellaiset laitteet keräävät ja välittävät suuria määriä informaatiota, joka voi sisältää laitteiden käyttäjien kannalta kriittistä ja yksityistä tietoa. Tästä syystä johtuen on erittäin merkityksellistä suojata verkon yli kerättävää ja jaettavaa tietoa. Monet tutkimukset osoittavat esineiden internet -laitteisiin kohdistuvien tietoturvahyökkäysten määrän olevan nousussa, ja samaan aikaan suuri osuus näistä laitteista ei omaa kunnollisia teknisiä ominaisuuksia itse laitteiden tai niiden käyttäjien yksityisen tiedon suojaamiseksi. Tässä väitöskirjassa tutkitaan pilvilaskennan sekä esineiden internetin tietoturvaa ja esitetään ohjelmistopohjaisia tietoturvalähestymistapoja turvautumalla osittain laitteistopohjaisiin teknologioihin. Esitetyt lähestymistavat tarjoavat vankkoja keinoja tietoturvallisuuden kohentamiseksi näissä konteksteissa. Tämän saavuttamiseksi työssä sovelletaan obfuskaatiota ja diversifiointia potentiaalisiana ohjelmistopohjaisina tietoturvatekniikkoina. Suoritettavan koodin obfuskointi suojaa pahantahtoiselta ohjelmiston takaisinmallinnukselta ja diversifiointi torjuu tietoturva-aukkojen laaja-alaisen hyödyntämisen riskiä. Väitöskirjatyössä tutkitaan luotettua laskentaa ja luotettavan laskennan suoritusalustoja laitteistopohjaisina tietoturvaratkaisuina. TPM (Trusted Platform Module) tarjoaa turvallisuutta ja luottamuksellisuutta rakentuen laitteistopohjaiseen luottamukseen. Pyrkimyksenä on taata suoritusalustan eheys. Työssä tutkitaan myös Intel SGX:ää yhtenä luotettavan suorituksen suoritusalustana, joka takaa suoritettavan koodin ja datan eheyden sekä luottamuksellisuuden pohjautuen suojatun säiliön, saarekkeen, tekniseen toteutukseen. Tarkemmin ilmaistuna työssä turvataan käyttöjärjestelmä- ja sovellusrajapintatasojen obfuskaation ja diversifioinnin kautta esineiden internet -laitteiden ohjelmistokerrosta. Soveltamalla samoja tekniikoita protokollakerrokseen, työssä suojataan laitteiden välistä tiedonvaihtoa verkkotasolla. Pilvilaskennan turvaamiseksi työssä sovelletaan obfuskaatio ja diversifiointitekniikoita asiakaspuolen ohjelmistoratkaisuihin. Vankemman tietoturvallisuuden saavuttamiseksi työssä hyödynnetään laitteistopohjaisia TPM- ja SGX-ratkaisuja. Tietoturvallisuuden lisäksi nämä ratkaisut tarjoavat monikerroksisen luottamuksen rakentuen laitteistotasolta ohjelmistokerrokseen asti. Tämän väitöskirjatutkimustyön tuloksena, osajulkaisuiden kautta, vastataan moniin esineiden internet -laitteisiin ja pilvilaskentaan kohdistuviin tietoturvauhkiin. Työssä esitetään myös näkemyksiä jatkotutkimusaiheista

Demystifying Internet of Things Security

Break down the misconceptions of the Internet of Things by examining the different security building blocks available in Intel Architecture (IA) based IoT platforms. This open access book reviews the threat pyramid, secure boot, chain of trust, and the SW stack leading up to defense-in-depth. The IoT presents unique challenges in implementing security and Intel has both CPU and Isolated Security Engine capabilities to simplify it. This book explores the challenges to secure these devices to make them immune to different threats originating from within and outside the network. The requirements and robustness rules to protect the assets vary greatly and there is no single blanket solution approach to implement security. Demystifying Internet of Things Security provides clarity to industry professionals and provides and overview of different security solutions What You'll Learn Secure devices, immunizing them against different threats originating from inside and outside the network Gather an overview of the different security building blocks available in Intel Architecture (IA) based IoT platforms Understand the threat pyramid, secure boot, chain of trust, and the software stack leading up to defense-in-depth Who This Book Is For Strategists, developers, architects, and managers in the embedded and Internet of Things (IoT) space trying to understand and implement the security in the IoT devices/platforms

Security and trust in a Network Functions Virtualisation Infrastructure

L'abstract è presente nell'allegato / the abstract is in the attachmen

Secure large-scale outsourced services founded on trustworthy code executions

Tese de doutoramento, Informática (Ciência da Computação), Universidade de Lisboa, Faculdade de Ciências, 2017The Cloud Computing model has incentivized companies to outsource services to third-party providers. Service owners can use third-party computational, storage and network resources while avoiding the cost of acquiring an IT infrastructure. However, they have to rely on the trustworthiness of the third-party providers, who ultimately need to guarantee that the services run as intended. The fundamental security challenge is how to empower companies that own and outsource such services, or clients using them, to check service execution on the remote cloud platform. A promising approach is based on hardware-enforced isolation and attestation of the service execution. Assuming that hardware attacks are infeasible, this protects the service from other malicious software or untrusted system administrators. Also, it allows clients to check that the results were produced as intended. While this paradigm is well known, previous work does not scale with large code and data sizes, lacks generality both with respect to hardware (e.g., either uses Trusted PlatformModules, TPMs, or Intel SGX) and software (e.g., only supports MapReduce applications), and makes undesirable security tradeoffs (e.g., resorts to a large Trusted Computing base, or TCB, to run unmodified services, or a small TCB but with limited functionality). This thesis shows how to secure the execution of large-scale services efficiently and without these compromises. From the perspective of a client that sends a request and receives a response, trust can be established by verifying a small proof of correct execution that is attached to the result. On the remote provider’s platform, a small trusted computing base enables the secure execution of generic services composed of a large source code base and/orworking on large data sets, using an abstraction layer that is implementable on diverse trusted hardware architectures. Our small TCB implements three orthogonal techniques that are the core contributions of this thesis. The first one targets the identification (and the execution) of only the part of code that is necessary to fulfill a client’s request. This allows an increase both in security and efficiency by leaving any code that is not required to run the service outside the execution environment. The second contribution enables terabyte-scale data processing by means of a secure in-memory data handling mechanism. This allows a service to retrieve data that is validated on access and before use. Notably, data I/O is performed using virtual memory mechanisms that do not require any system call from the trusted execution environment, thereby reducing the attack surface. The third contribution is a novel fully-passive secure replication scheme that is tolerant to software attacks. Fault-tolerance delivers availability guarantees to clients, while passive replication allows for computationally efficient processing. Interestingly, all of our techniques are based on the same abstraction layer of the trusted hardware. In addition, our implementation and experimental evaluation demonstrate the practicality of these approaches.O modelo de computação baseado em Nuvem incentivou as empresas a externalizar serviços a fornecedores terceiros. Os proprietários destes serviços podem utilizar recursos externos de computação, armazenamento e rede, evitando o custo de aquisição¸ de uma infraestrutura IT. No entanto, têm de confiar que os serviços de fornecedores terceiros funcionem como planeado. O desafio fundamental da segurança ´e fazer com que as empresas que possuem e externalizam serviços, ou clientes que utilizam estes, possam controlar a execução do serviço na plataforma remota baseada em Nuvem. Uma abordagem promissora é o isolamento e a atestacão da execucão do serviço a n´nível hardware. Assumindo que os ataques ao hardware não são possíveis, o servic¸o fica protegido contra software malicioso ou administradores de sistema suspeitos. Além disso, permite aos clientes controlarem que os resultados tenham sido produzidos como planeado. Embora esta abordagem seja bem conhecida, os trabalhos anteriores não escalam com grandes quantidades de código e dados, carecem de generalidade em relacão ao hardware (e.g., utilizam TPMs ou SGX) e ao software (e.g., recorrem a uma Trusted Computing base, ou TCB, complexa para a execução de serviços não modificados, ou a uma TCB simplificada que tem funcionalidades limitadas). Esta tese propõe uma proteção para a execucão de serviços de grande escala de forma eficiente e sem as limitações anteriores. Da perspectiva de um cliente que envia um pedido e recebe uma resposta, a confiança pode ser estabelecida através de uma pequena prova de que a execução foi correcta que é anexada à resposta. Na plataforma do fornecedor remoto, um pequeno dispositivo de computação fiável permite a execução segura de serviços genéricos constituídos por uma grande quantidade de código e/ou que processam grandes conjuntos de dados, utilizando um nível de abstração que pode ser implementado em diversas arquitecturas de hardware fiável. A nossa TCB simplificada implementa três técnicas independentes que são os contributos centrais desta tese. A primeira foca-se na identificação (e na execução) apenas da parte de código que ´e precisa para completar um pedido de um cliente. Isto permite um aumento de segurança e eficiência porque o código que não é necessário para executar o serviço fica fora do ambiente de execução. A segunda contribuição permite o processamento de dados na escala de um terabyte através de um mecanismo seguro de gestão dos dados em memória. Isso permite a um serviço carregar dados que são validados quando são acedidos e antes de serem utilizados. Em particular, a inserção e a saída dos dados é feita utilizando mecanismos de memória virtual que não necessitam de chamadas de sistema a partir do ambiente de execução fiável, reduzindo portanto a superfície de ataque. A terceira contribuição é um novo esquema de replicação seguro completamente passivo que é tolerante a ataques de software. A tolerância a faltas garante disponibilidade aos clientes, enquanto a replicação passiva permite um processamento eficiente do ponto de vista computacional. Curiosamente, todas as técnicas são baseadas no mesmo nível de abstração do hardware fiável. Além disso, a nossa implementação e avaliação ao experimental demonstram a praticidade destas abordagens

Rapid Response Command and Control (R2C2): a systems engineering analysis of scaleable communications for Regional Combatant Commanders

Includes supplementary materialDisaster relief operations, such as the 2005 Tsunami and Hurricane Katrina, and wartime operations, such as Operation Enduring Freedom and Operation Iraqi Freedom, have identified the need for a standardized command and control system interoperable among Joint, Coalition, and Interagency entities. The Systems Engineering Analysis Cohort 9 (SEA-9) Rapid Response Command and Control (R2C2) integrated project team completed a systems engineering (SE) process to address the military’s command and control capability gap. During the process, the R2C2 team conducted mission analysis, generated requirements, developed and modeled architectures, and analyzed and compared current operational systems versus the team’s R2C2 system. The R2C2 system provided a reachback capability to the Regional Combatant Commander’s (RCC) headquarters, a local communications network for situational assessments, and Internet access for civilian counterparts participating in Humanitarian Assistance/Disaster Relief operations. Because the team designed the R2C2 system to be modular, analysis concluded that the R2C2 system was the preferred method to provide the RCC with the required flexibility and scalability to deliver a rapidly deployable command and control capability to perform the range of military operations

Efficacy of Incident Response Certification in the Workforce

Numerous cybersecurity certifications are available both commercially and via institutes of higher learning. Hiring managers, recruiters, and personnel accountable for new hires need to make informed decisions when selecting personnel to fill positions. An incident responder or security analyst\u27s role requires near real-time decision-making, pervasive knowledge of the environments they are protecting, and functional situational awareness. This concurrent mixed methods paper studies whether current commercial certifications offered in the cybersecurity realm, particularly incident response, provide useful indicators for a viable hiring candidate. Managers and non-managers alike do prefer hiring candidates with an incident response certification. Both groups affirmatively believe commercial cybersecurity certified job candidates with that same certification can update, modify, and improve the incident response process. The reasoning for this belief is focused more on tie-breaking and common parlance within the information security analyst domain and less on the ability to perform the job. A practical component within the certification process is valuable, and networking expertise is the primary interest of those seeking qualified incident responders. The qualitative component highlighted soft-skills, such as communication, enthusiasm, critical thinking, and awareness, as sought-after abilities lacking in certification offerings covered within this study