CCRI: ENS: Modernizing and Streamlining DeterLab Testbed Experimentation

该项目通过以下方式对公开可用的detlab网络安全测试平台进行现代化改造：(1)更新社区研究基础设施（交换机和节点），以支持大规模虚拟化实验；(2)简化实验流程，以扩大新用户社区的参与。目前，使用detlab的机构中有三分之一是社区学院和规模较小的大学，它们缺乏专门的研究基础设施。这个新一代的社区研究基础设施将为服务不足的研究和学生群体提供强大的帮助。该项目将通过一项开创性计划进行，以：(1)使公共网络安全实验室测试平台的社区研究基础设施现代化，以及(2)简化实验流程，以扩大新用户社区的参与。研究基础设施现代化将通过三个架构变化来实现：(1)用支持可编程软件定义网络（SDN）和以太网虚拟专用网（EVPN）和虚拟可扩展局域网（VXLAN）数据平面封装的现代白盒交换机取代目前已有15年历史的网络交换机；(2)用144个高密度节点取代所有过时（超过10年）的旧PC节点，这些节点支持在一个物理节点上多个节点的虚拟化；(3)取代当前过时的基于Emulab的试验台软件；采用模块化和现代化的合并软件。这些更改将使测试平台现代化，使其更加健壮、可靠和自我维持，并通过资源虚拟化支持更多用户。这些变化还将使用户能够使用可重构拓扑和跨多个测试平台进行大规模实验。该项目将通过以下方式进一步简化现代化的detlab试验台的实验过程：(1)将多年来开发的几种测试平台实验解决方案（虚拟化、流量生成器、编排软件、恶意软件实验环境等）与主流测试平台软件充分集成，并将其文档化并提供给所有用户；(2)提供一套多个网络安全领域的实验模板，用户可以从这些模板开始，并根据自己的需求进行演变；这些模板将包括新的集成实验解决方案，(3)每月提供实时和录制的网络研讨会，并在网络安全会议和研讨会以及多样性会议和研讨会上提供教程和演示，以吸引新用户使用现代化的detlab测试平台。简化实验过程将使现有用户更容易设计和执行实验，并将吸引和简化新用户的入门。社区参与和外展活动将确保现有和新用户为现代化项目提供投入。关于detlab的更多信息可以在https://deter-project.org/This上找到，该奖项反映了美国国家科学基金会的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的知识价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

This project modernizes the publicly available DeterLab cybersecurity testbed by: (1) updating the community research infrastructure (switches and nodes) to support large scale, virtualized experiments, (2) streamlining the experimentation process to broaden participation of new user communities. One third of the institutions using DeterLab today are community colleges and smaller universities, which lack dedicated research infrastructure. This new generation of Community Research Infrastructure will offer powerful assistance to level the playing field for the underserved research and student populations.The project will be carried out through a groundbreaking program to: (1) modernize the community research infrastructure of the public DeterLab testbed for cybersecurity experimentation, and to (2) streamline the experimentation process to broaden participation of new user communities. Research infrastructure modernization will be achieved with three architectural changes: (1) replacing current, 15-year old network switches with modern whitebox switches, which support programmable software-defined networking (SDN) and Ethernet Virtual Private Network (EVPN) with Virtual Extensible LAN (VXLAN) dataplane encapsulation, (2) replacing all dated (over 10 years) old PC nodes with 144 high-density nodes, which support virtualization of many nodes on one physical node, (3) replacing current, outdated, testbed software, based on Emulab, with modular and modern Merge software. These changes will modernize the testbed, making it more robust, reliable, and self-sustainable, supporting many more users through resource virtualization. These changes will additionally enable users to perform large-scale experiments with reconfigurable topologies and across multiple testbeds.The project will further streamline the experimentation process on the modernized DeterLab testbed by: (1) fully integrating several solutions for testbed experimentation (virtualization, traffic generators, orchestration software, malware experimentation environment, etc.), developed over the years, with the mainstream testbed software, documenting them and making them available to all users, (2) providing a set of experiment templates in several cybersecurity domains that users can start from and evolve to fit their needs; these templates will include the newly-integrated experimentation solutions, (3) offering live and recorded Webinars on monthly basis, and offering tutorials and demos at cybersecurity conferences and workshops, as well as diversity conferences and workshops, to attract new users to the modernized DeterLab testbed. Streamlining the experimentation process will make it easier for current users to design and perform experiments, and will attract and ease the on-boarding for new users. Community engagement and outreach activities will ensure that existing and new users provide input to the modernization project. Additional information on DeterLab can be found at https://deter-project.org/This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.