CT-L: Collaborative Research: Comprehensive Application Analysis and Control

当试图保护现代计算机网络时，一个深层次的、普遍存在的问题来自于这些网络承载的令人困惑的应用范围。除非了解特定的应用，否则无法可靠地监视和控制它的存在。然而，在过去的十年中，我们已经看到了数百种应用程序的兴起和使用，这种增长远远超过了安全从业人员理解其个人操作和影响的能力。 这项研究工作的目的是促进普遍的理解和控制的财富的应用程序协议在今天的网络上运行。开发深入了解这些协议的能力，必然会带来新的功能，用于公开社区中尚未很好理解的现代应用程序的内部工作。 这样的理解将提供实用的，高影响力的功能，因为运营商将能够直接将这些信息纳入他们的监控工作。该项目的一个关键目标是促进更广泛的网络研究社区可以共同努力，共同构建跨领域共享的应用分析资源。 该项目设想了一种“通用弗兰卡”，用于表达应用协议结构和语义，通过提供一个通用平台和语言来表达广泛的语义和分析，超越现状。虽然我们项目的重点是为了监控和保护网络而进行的应用程序分析，但我们开发的工具通常可以重新利用，以支持其他网络问题，如网络管理、故障排除和性能优化。

A deep, pervasive problem when attempting to secure modern computer networks arises from the bewildering range of applications that these networks carry.Unless a specific application is understood, its presence cannot be soundly monitored and controlled. Yet we have seen in the past decade the rise and use of many hundreds of applications, a growth far outpacing the ability of security practitioners to apprehend their individual operation and implications. This research effort aims to facilitate pervasive understanding and control of the wealth of application protocols running on today's networks. Developing in-depth visibility into these protocols will perforce lead to new capabilities for exposing the inner-workings of modern applications that have yet to be well understood within the community. Such understanding will provide pragmatic, high-impact functionality, since operators will be able to directly incorporate this information in their monitoring efforts.A key goal of the undertaking is to facilitate the means by which the broader network research community can work together to jointly construct application analysis resources that are shared across the field. The project envisions a "lingua franca" for expressing application protocol structure and semantics that moves beyond the status quo by providing a common platform and language for expressing a wide range of semantics and analyses. While the focus within our project is on application analysis for purposes of monitoring and securing networks, the tools we develop will often lend themselves to repurposing in support of other networking concerns such as network management, trouble-shooting, and performance optimization.