51,313 research outputs found
Toward least-privilege isolation for software
Hackers leverage software vulnerabilities to disclose, tamper with, or destroy sensitive
data. To protect sensitive data, programmers can adhere to the principle of
least-privilege, which entails giving software the minimal privilege it needs to operate,
which ensures that sensitive data is only available to software components on a
strictly need-to-know basis. Unfortunately, applying this principle in practice is dif-
�cult, as current operating systems tend to provide coarse-grained mechanisms for
limiting privilege. Thus, most applications today run with greater-than-necessary
privileges. We propose sthreads, a set of operating system primitives that allows
�ne-grained isolation of software to approximate the least-privilege ideal. sthreads
enforce a default-deny model, where software components have no privileges by default,
so all privileges must be explicitly granted by the programmer.
Experience introducing sthreads into previously monolithic applications|thus,
partitioning them|reveals that enumerating privileges for sthreads is di�cult in
practice. To ease the introduction of sthreads into existing code, we include Crowbar,
a tool that can be used to learn the privileges required by a compartment. We
show that only a few changes are necessary to existing code in order to partition
applications with sthreads, and that Crowbar can guide the programmer through
these changes. We show that applying sthreads to applications successfully narrows
the attack surface by reducing the amount of code that can access sensitive data.
Finally, we show that applications using sthreads pay only a small performance
overhead. We applied sthreads to a range of applications. Most notably, an SSL
web server, where we show that sthreads are powerful enough to protect sensitive
data even against a strong adversary that can act as a man-in-the-middle in the
network, and also exploit most code in the web server; a threat model not addressed
to date
Customizing Data-plane Processing in Edge Routers
While OpenFlow enables the customization of the control plane of a router, currently no solutions are available for the customization of the data plane. This paper presents a prototype that offers to third parties (even end-users) the possibility to install their own applications on the data plane of a router, particularly the ones operating at the edge of the network. This paper presents the motivation of the idea, the reason why we use OpenFlow even if it does not seem appropriate for the data plane, the architecture and the implementation of our prototype, and a first characterization of the system running in our la
A Mediated Definite Delegation Model allowing for Certified Grid Job Submission
Grid computing infrastructures need to provide traceability and accounting of
their users" activity and protection against misuse and privilege escalation. A
central aspect of multi-user Grid job environments is the necessary delegation
of privileges in the course of a job submission. With respect to these generic
requirements this document describes an improved handling of multi-user Grid
jobs in the ALICE ("A Large Ion Collider Experiment") Grid Services. A security
analysis of the ALICE Grid job model is presented with derived security
objectives, followed by a discussion of existing approaches of unrestricted
delegation based on X.509 proxy certificates and the Grid middleware gLExec.
Unrestricted delegation has severe security consequences and limitations, most
importantly allowing for identity theft and forgery of delegated assignments.
These limitations are discussed and formulated, both in general and with
respect to an adoption in line with multi-user Grid jobs. Based on the
architecture of the ALICE Grid Services, a new general model of mediated
definite delegation is developed and formulated, allowing a broker to assign
context-sensitive user privileges to agents. The model provides strong
accountability and long- term traceability. A prototype implementation allowing
for certified Grid jobs is presented including a potential interaction with
gLExec. The achieved improvements regarding system security, malicious job
exploitation, identity protection, and accountability are emphasized, followed
by a discussion of non- repudiation in the face of malicious Grid jobs
Emergent Behavior in Cybersecurity
We argue that emergent behavior is inherent to cybersecurity.Comment: 2 pages, HotSoS'2014 (2014 Symposium and Bootcamp on the Science of
Security
Hierarchical Role-Based Access Control with Homomorphic Encryption for Database as a Service
Database as a service provides services for accessing and managing customers
data which provides ease of access, and the cost is less for these services.
There is a possibility that the DBaaS service provider may not be trusted, and
data may be stored on untrusted server. The access control mechanism can
restrict users from unauthorized access, but in cloud environment access
control policies are more flexible. However, an attacker can gather sensitive
information for a malicious purpose by abusing the privileges as another user
and so database security is compromised. The other problems associated with the
DBaaS are to manage role hierarchy and secure session management for query
transaction in the database. In this paper, a role-based access control for the
multitenant database with role hierarchy is proposed. The query is granted with
least access privileges, and a session key is used for session management. The
proposed work protects data from privilege escalation and SQL injection. It
uses the partial homomorphic encryption (Paillier Encryption) for the
encrypting the sensitive data. If a query is to perform any operation on
sensitive data, then extra permissions are required for accessing sensitive
data. Data confidentiality and integrity are achieved using the role-based
access control with partial homomorphic encryption.Comment: 11 Pages,4 figures, Proceedings of International Conference on ICT
for Sustainable Developmen
Leveraging OpenStack and Ceph for a Controlled-Access Data Cloud
While traditional HPC has and continues to satisfy most workflows, a new
generation of researchers has emerged looking for sophisticated, scalable,
on-demand, and self-service control of compute infrastructure in a cloud-like
environment. Many also seek safe harbors to operate on or store sensitive
and/or controlled-access data in a high capacity environment.
To cater to these modern users, the Minnesota Supercomputing Institute
designed and deployed Stratus, a locally-hosted cloud environment powered by
the OpenStack platform, and backed by Ceph storage. The subscription-based
service complements existing HPC systems by satisfying the following unmet
needs of our users: a) on-demand availability of compute resources, b)
long-running jobs (i.e., days), c) container-based computing with
Docker, and d) adequate security controls to comply with controlled-access data
requirements.
This document provides an in-depth look at the design of Stratus with respect
to security and compliance with the NIH's controlled-access data policy.
Emphasis is placed on lessons learned while integrating OpenStack and Ceph
features into a so-called "walled garden", and how those technologies
influenced the security design. Many features of Stratus, including tiered
secure storage with the introduction of a controlled-access data "cache",
fault-tolerant live-migrations, and fully integrated two-factor authentication,
depend on recent OpenStack and Ceph features.Comment: 7 pages, 5 figures, PEARC '18: Practice and Experience in Advanced
Research Computing, July 22--26, 2018, Pittsburgh, PA, US
- …