CAREER: Flexible Multi-Core Substrate for Trustworthy Computing Systems

一个芯片上有4到8个核心的多核体系结构在今天已经成为现实，预计未来几代处理器的每个芯片将包含更多的核心。该项目的目标是充分发挥大规模多核处理器作为安全可信计算基板的潜力。首先，在多核处理器中，大量处理元件的可用性加上对功耗的限制，缓解了对资源的大量分时需求，这往往会导致各种类型的旁路。此更改允许在此项目中使用更多专用和静态分配的资源，以提供强大的隔离和简化的可信软件基础。第二，大规模多核中的许多可编程处理元件可以作为各种类型细粒度检测的通用基板。该项目正在开发一个灵活的架构框架，用于各种运行时检查，并将开销降至最低，以便自动检测、诊断恶意软件攻击并从中恢复。最后，该项目将体系结构框架扩展到安全之外的其他信任方面，重点放在硅后验证上，其中动态检查可以确保各种正确性属性。这项研究将在安全和核查方面提供硬件支持的好处，而不需要为单一的固定机制提供专门的资源。用户可以将每个“扩展核心”用于各种安全目的、验证和可靠性目的，甚至用于一般计算。同时，研究还将实现高度安全的执行环境，其中关键软件组件可以得到更好的保护。

Multi-core architecture with 4 to 8 cores on a die is a reality today and future generations of processors are expected to contain even more cores per chip. This project targets to realize the full potential of large-scale multi-core processors as a secure and trustworthy computing substrate. First, in "many-core" processors, the availability of a large number of processing elements together with constraints on power consumption alleviates the need for heavy time-sharing of resources, which often results in various types of side-channels. This change enables the use of more dedicated and statically allocated resources in this project to provide strong isolation and a simplified trusted software base. Second, many programmable processing elements in large-scale multi-cores can serve as a general substrate for various types of fine-grained inspection. This project is developing a flexible architecture framework for various run-time checks with minimal overheads in order to automatically detect, diagnose, and recover from malicious software attacks. Finally, the project extends the architectural framework to other aspects of trust beyond security, focusing on post-silicon verification, where the dynamic inspection can ensure various correctness properties. The research will deliver the benefits of hardware support in security and verification without requiring dedicated resources for a single fixed mechanism. Users can use each "extended core" for various security purposes, for verification and reliability purposes, or even for general computing. At the same time, the research will also enable highly secure execution environments where critical software components can be better protected.