CAREER: Towards Reliable and Quantum-resistant Connected Vehicle Security

不幸的是，死于机动车事故的人数每年都在增加，人为错误是造成严重车祸的主要原因。为了通过驾驶员辅助和自动驾驶系统提高道路安全和效率，蜂窝车辆到一切(C-V2X)是支持包括车辆到车辆(V2V)通信在内的互联车辆服务的全球领先技术，并将向6G蜂窝技术扩展。特别是，允许车辆在车载传感器感知范围之外直接交换信息的V2V通信对社会有许多实实在在的好处，有可能防止相当大比例的撞车事故，提高交通系统效率(减少旅行时间、污染等)，并增强弱势社区的流动性。然而，尽管为C-V2X设计的经典安全协议由来已久，但这项技术很容易受到来自新兴量子计算机的迫在眉睫的量子攻击，威胁到安全关键消息的“完整性”，以及对目前未准备好的通信协议的拒绝服务攻击，这些通信协议阻碍了对这些量子攻击的可能缓解。单独或联合应对这些攻击是具有挑战性的，对日益增长的互联汽车服务和未来自动驾驶服务的安全构成重大风险，特别是在当前硬件(车辆的预期寿命为12-15年)在快速运行后量子算法方面效率低下的情况下。鉴于汽车行业的硬件和其他实际限制，这个职业项目改进并重新关注现有的V2V通信和安全协议，以支持后量子算法。通过新的安全协议和向后兼容的通信技术来预防、缓解和评估量子攻击，该项目将当前的C-V2X生态系统转变为密码敏捷，以便在未来20年分阶段过渡到量子抵抗生态系统。研究和教育议程围绕三个方面：(1)建立路线图和过渡计划，为过渡的不同阶段(例如，兼容硬件可用之前和之后)设计特定的临时安全协议；(2)通过优化MAC层的资源调度技术来支持后量子算法，以容纳更多消息，并在物理层开发新的消息筛选技术，以减少安全模块上的完整性验证负载；以及(3)通过将开源的V2V安全测试床转换为具有大规模(NSF资助的)测试床接口的交互平台，开发一种独特的数字双胞胎原型，其中注入了软件定义的无线电。作为该项目的组成部分，将使用数字孪生兄弟(而不是昂贵的城市实验)来全面评估拟议的技术，并开发一款用于游戏化联网车辆安全教育的新型游戏。它在游戏设计、无线安全和汽车行业之间培养新的跨学科研究，提供协同研究和教育成果，并将通过针对弱势(聋人和听力障碍)社区的包容性移动倡议和创新教育途径来帮助扩大影响，以培训下一代代表性不足的网络安全专家。PI将通过开放式讲座、学术/公共展览以及各种大学和K-12竞赛来传播新的课程模块、动手实验和新的游戏。研究成果将与支持安全创新的利益相关者、安全标准的标准化机构(NIST、IEEE)以及3GPP和汽车行业的6G C-V2X规范共享。该奖项反映了NSF的法定使命，并已通过使用基金会的智力优势和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

The number of people who die in motor vehicle accidents unfortunately increases every year with human error as a primary cause of serious crashes. To enhance roadway safety and efficiency through driver-assistance and automated-driving systems, cellular vehicle-to-everything (C-V2X) is the globally preeminent technology to support connected vehicle services, including vehicle-to-vehicle (V2V) communications, and is set for expansion toward 6G cellular technology. In particular, V2V communication that allows vehicles to directly exchange messages beyond the perception range of on-board sensors has many tangible benefits to society with the potential to prevent a significant percentage of crashes, increase transportation system efficiency (reducing travel time, pollution, etc.), and enhance mobility for disadvantaged communities. Despite long-standing classical security protocols designed for C-V2X, however, this technology is vulnerable to imminent quantum attacks from emerging quantum computers threatening the “integrity” of safety-critical messages, and to denial-of-service attacks at the currently unprepared communication protocols hindering possible mitigations for those quantum attacks. Countering these attacks, separately or jointly, is challenging, a significant risk to the safety of the growing connected vehicle services and future autonomous ones, especially as current hardware (with 12-15 year life expectancy on vehicles) is inefficient at running post-quantum algorithms fast enough.This CAREER project refines and refocuses existing V2V communication and security protocols, without an overhaul, to support post-quantum algorithms, given the hardware and other practical limitations in the automotive industry. With novel security protocols and backward-compatible communication techniques to prevent, mitigate, and evaluate quantum attacks, this project transforms the current C-V2X ecosystem to become crypto-agile for a staged transition over the next two decades into a quantum-resistant one. The research and education agenda is framed around three thrusts: (1) Establishing a roadmap and a transition plan in designing specific interim security protocols for different stages of the transition (e.g., before and after compatible hardware is available); (2) Supporting post-quantum algorithms by optimizing the resource scheduling techniques at the MAC layer to accommodate more messages, and developing novel message sieving techniques at the physical layer to reduce the integrity verification loads on the security modules; and (3) Developing a unique prototype of a digital twin infused with software-defined radios by converting an open-source V2V security testbed to an interactive platform with interfaces to large-scale (NSF-funded) testbeds. As an integral part of this project, a digital twin will be used (instead of costly urban experiments) for comprehensive evaluation of the proposed techniques and development of a novel game for gamifying connected vehicle security education. It cultivates new interdisciplinary research among game design, wireless security, and the automotive industry, providing for synergistic research and education outcomes, and will also help broaden the impacts through inclusive mobility initiatives for disadvantaged (deaf and hard-of-hearing) communities and innovative educational pathways to train next generation of under-represented cybersecurity experts. The PI will disseminate new course modules, hands-on labs, and the new games through open-access lectures, academic/public exhibits, and various collegiate and K-12 competitions. The research outcomes will be shared with stakeholders for supporting safe innovations, standardization bodies (NIST, IEEE) for security standards, and 3GPP and automotive industry for 6G C-V2X specifications.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.