Methods and tools for intrusion-aware software systems

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Software systems must be engineered with reliable protection mechanisms, while still delivering the expected value of the software within the budgeted cost and time. The principal obstacle in achieving these two different but interdependent objectives is that current software engineering processes do not provide adequate methods and tools to achieve security goals. As a result, security loopholes often leave the system vulnerable to malicious attacks and abuses. In this research, various methods and tools will be developed with a view to building intrusion-aware software systems.    Available software specification languages are not completely suitable for specifying security related aspects of software, while attack languages are not useful for software development. The use of two different languages for software specification and security specification involves a number of unwanted but complicated issues. This research will focus on the factors related to the limitations of the existing intrusion scenario description mechanisms and the corresponding intrusion detectors, and will design ways to overcome them. A specification method will be proposed which can be used to specify both normal operational behavior and the behavior of the target when it is under known attack. Formal syntax and semantics of the features required for intrusion scenario specifications will be provided. Tools will be built for intrusion scenario description and automatic signature generation from the scenarios. Finally, intrusion detection systems will be developed to detect any intrusions into the software systems by comparing the run-time behavior of the systems with the generated signatures.    This research will play a vital role in bridging the gap between software engineering and security engineering practices. One of the unique aspects of this research proposal is to provide a balanced training facility for graduate students (2 PhD and 2 MSc) including both software engineering and security engineering principles for building secure software products.