ITR: Covirt: Security Defenses for Insecure Operating Systems

确保当今计算机系统的安全是一个紧迫而困难的问题。当前软件系统的复杂性和快速变化使开发人员无法足够彻底地验证或审核代码以消除漏洞。该项目旨在提供在操作系统和应用程序受到损害的情况下工作的安全防御。即使攻击者破坏了操作系统，这些防御也将继续确保其预期的安全策略。这种新的安全级别是通过在易受攻击的操作系统和应用程序下面添加虚拟机层来实现的。这个额外的软件层使新的安全服务不依赖于目标软件的完整性。该项目探索了可以通过虚拟机添加的四种新的安全服务：1)重放和分析计算机系统完整的、一条指令一条指令执行的能力，包括在妥协点之后的操作；(2)在入侵后将系统恢复到先前状态的能力；(3)通过安全测试假设的“如果”场景来防止入侵的能力；(4)通过监视计算机系统的所有动作来检测入侵的能力。

Ensuring the security of today's computer systems is an urgent and difficultproblem. The complexity and rapid pace of change in current software systemsprevents developers from verifying or auditing the code thoroughly enough toeliminate vulnerabilities. This project seeks to provide security defensesthat work in the presence of compromised operating systems and applications.Even if an attacker compromises the operating system, these defenses willcontinue to ensure their intended security policies.This new level of security is made possible by adding a virtual-machine layerunderneath the vulnerable operating system and applications. This additionalsoftware layer enables new security services that do not depend on theintegrity of the target software. This project explores four new securityservices that can be added via virtual machines: 1) the ability to replayand analyze the complete, instruction-by-instruction execution of a computersystem, including actions after the point of compromise; (2) the ability torecover the system to a prior state after an intrusion; (3) the ability toprevent intrusions by safely testing hypothetical "what if" scenarios; and (4)the ability to detect intrusions by monitoring all actions of the computersystem.