Analysing Security and Privacy Properties

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Security systems break because design practices focus too much on mechanisms, at the expense of clearly-defined properties. The vision of this research is to bring about a shift of emphasis to highlight the properties that security systems are expected to provide. This will be done by developing methods for verification of security systems. I will focus on a selection of interconnected real-world problems that are of great importance to society, but that are currently in need of greater industry/academe cooperation. The combination of fundamental research with close collaboration with industry, government and users is expected to achieve significant results and impact. I will develop and apply new methods and techniques to create and analyse solutions in three areas:* Trusted computing is an industry-led technology that aims to root security in hardware. Since its launch, academics including me have discovered significant issues that threaten to undermine its potential at providing a range of security benefits. This has arisen because industry does not have the expertise to analyse the protocols.* Electronic voting is an application currently attracting significant interest from government and industry, but numerous security issues have resulted in failure of confidence among politicians, commentators and public alike.* Privacy for citizens using electronic services is hotly debated by journalists and user groups and politicians, but has been substantially eroded by new technologies and policies.In these three areas, there is currently the risk of significant waste of resources on inappropriate or unaccepted technologies, resulting in user disempowerment and exclusion. The outcomes of this fellowship are intended to address that risk.A distinguishing feature of the proposal is the substantial engagement with industry and user groups that are active in these three areas. As a result of discussions with them, several organisations have committed significant resources, including cash contribution, manager and developer time, and access to users and experts.