- Title
- Secure Module Invocation System (SMIS): a study of program execution in a secure operating system environment
- Creator
- Al-Windawi, Enas
- Relation
- University of Newcastle Research Higher Degree Thesis
- Resource Type
- thesis
- Date
- 2019
- Description
- Research Doctorate - Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)
- Description
- With increasing numbers of successful computer attacks by those who are using the Internet and exploiting weaknesses and security gaps in operating systems, applications and software, software security has become an important issue in computer security. Any successful computer hacking attack can create a disaster for networks and important secret information such as personal data, privileged accounts and email passwords stored in the various computers within the network by exploiting human vulnerabilities. The main aim of this research is to design and present a new program execution environment that will offer secure services for applications that prevent people bypassing the security of the system. It also aims to increase extensibility, flexibility and protection. These aims are not significantly different to those of some other operating systems, though this thesis aims to bring these protections to user space. This thesis proposes a Secure Module Invocation System (SMIS) for software protection and, once implemented, measures its performance. Our system architecture utilises key components from the SPEEDOS operating system. The SMIS is designed to provide a trusted and secure program execution environment. The architectural model can be used to improve the security of non-secure applications. Protection in SMIS is implemented through various mechanisms such as capabilities and bracket routines, and also supports an information-hiding structure for user resources. These resources are referred to as modules. Capabilities are protected in SMIS by either other capabilities or by passwords. In SMIS, bracket routines are also significant because they provide the foundation for flexible protection and freely programmable access checks. SMIS implements the information-hiding concept, which prohibits direct access to the data of another module unless the client presents the SMIS with a capability that confers the suitable authority. Implementing this concept in SMIS enhances the flexibility of software systems by providing dependencies among software units. Also, SMIS supports a new security mechanism that allows users to qualify their modules. The invocation of the target module is then redirected to the suitable bracket routine(s). Without changing the role of capabilities, bracket routines may accept, or reject, access to the target module based on arbitrary rules. Brackets can be individually and dynamically incorporated with the target module at runtime. The bracketing technique permits users to implement any security policy they consider suitable. A prototype has been implemented to test the proposed environment and evaluate the outcomes of using the different approaches attackers use to damage applications. The results indicate that augmenting a non-secure module with a bracket routine can provide benefits for target modules and an overall benefit for software and applications. Further, adding bracket routines dynamically at runtime can effectively improve the flexibility and extensibility of the software system.
- Subject
- SPEEDOS; capability; bracket routines; information-hiding principle; module
- Identifier
- http://hdl.handle.net/1959.13/1406252
- Identifier
- uon:35608
- Rights
- Copyright 2019 Enas Al-Windawi
- Language
- eng
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| Thumbnail | File | Description | Size | Format | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| View Details Download | ATTACHMENT01 | Thesis | 1 MB | Adobe Acrobat PDF | View Details Download | ||
| View Details Download | ATTACHMENT02 | Abstract | 200 KB | Adobe Acrobat PDF | View Details Download |