Fraunhofer-Institut für Angewandte und Integrierte Sicherheit AISEC

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  • Publication
    VIA: Analyzing Device Interfaces of Protected Virtual Machines
    ( 2021)
    Hetzelt, Felicitas
    ;
    Radev, Martin
    ;
    Buhren, Robert
    ;
    Morbitzer, Mathias
    ;
    Seifert, Jean-Pierre
    Both AMD and Intel have presented technologies for confidential computing in cloud environments. The proposed solutions - AMD SEV (-ES, -SNP) and Intel TDX - protect Virtual Machines (VMs) against attacks from higher privileged layers through memory encryption and integrity protection. This model of computation draws a new trust boundary between virtual devices and the VM, which in so far lacks thorough examination. In this paper, we therefore present an analysis of the virtual device interface and discuss several attack vectors against a protected VM. Further, we develop and evaluate VIA, an automated analysis tool to detect cases of improper sanitization of input recieved via the virtual device interface. VIA improves upon existing approaches for the automated analysis of device interfaces in the following aspects: (i) support for virtualization relevant buses, (ii) efficient Direct Memory Access (DMA) support and (iii) performance. VIA builds upon the Linux Kernel Library and clang's libfuzzer to fuzz the communication between the driver and the device via MMIO, PIO, and DMA. An evaluation of VIA shows that it performs 570 executions per second on average and improves performance compared to existing approaches by an average factor of 2706. Using VIA, we analyzed 22 drivers in Linux 5.10.0-rc6, thereby uncovering 50 bugs and initiating multiple patches to the virtual device driver interface of Linux. To prove our findings criticality under the threat model of AMD SEV and Intel TDX, we showcase three exemplary attacks based on the bugs found. The attacks enable a malicious hypervisor to corrupt the memory and gain code execution in protected VMs with SEV-ES and are theoretically applicable to SEV-SNP and TDX.
  • Publication
    Blockchain and smart contracts
    (Fraunhofer-Gesellschaft, 2018)
    Schütte, Julian
    ;
    Fridgen, Gilbert
    ;
    Prinz, Wolfgang
    ;
    Rose, Thomas
    ;
    Urbach, Nils
    ;
    Hoeren, Thomas
    ;
    Guggenberger, Nikolas
    ;
    Welzel, Christian
    ;
    Holly, Steffen
    ;
    Schulte, Axel
    ;
    Sprenger, Philipp
    ;
    Schwede, Christian
    ;
    Weimert, Birgit
    ;
    Otto, Boris
    ;
    Dalheimer, Mathias
    ;
    Wenzel, Markus
    ;
    Kreutzer, Michael
    ;
    Fritz, Michael
    ;
    Leiner, Ulrich
    ;
    Nouak, Alexander
    ;
    Prinz, Wolfgang
    ;
    Schulte, Axel T.
    This position paper analyzes blockchain technology from the scientific and application-oriented perspective of the Fraunhofer-Gesellschaft. It examines relevant technical aspects and related research questions. It shows that technology still has fundamental research and development challenges in all areas. These include, for example, the modularization of individual blockchain concepts as well as their combination and integration for application-specific blockchain solutions.
  • Publication
    Blockchain und Smart Contracts
    (Fraunhofer-Gesellschaft, 2017)
    Schütte, Julian
    ;
    Fridgen, Gilbert
    ;
    Prinz, Wolfgang
    ;
    Rose, Thomas
    ;
    Urbach, Nils
    ;
    Hoeren, Thomas
    ;
    Guggenberger, Nikolas
    ;
    Welzel, Christian
    ;
    Holly, Steffen
    ;
    Schulte, Axel
    ;
    Sprenger, Philipp
    ;
    Schwede, Christian
    ;
    Weimert, Birgit
    ;
    Otto, Boris
    ;
    Dalheimer, Mathias
    ;
    Wenzel, Markus
    ;
    Kreutzer, Michael
    ;
    Fritz, Michael
    ;
    Leiner, Ulrich
    ;
    Nouak, Alexander
    ;
    Prinz, Wolfgang
    ;
    Schulte, Axel T.
    Dieses Positionspapier analysiert die Blockchain-Technologie aus wissenschaftlicher und anwendungsorientierter Sicht der Fraunhofer-Gesellschaft. Es untersucht relevante Technikaspekte und damit verbundene Forschungsfragen. Dabei zeigt sich, dass die Technik in allen Bereichen noch grundlegende Forschungs- und Entwicklungs-Herausforderungen aufweist. Diese liegen beispielsweise in der Modularisierung einzelner Blockchain-Konzepte sowie deren Kombination und Integration für anwendungsspezifische Blockchain-Lösungen.
  • Publication
    Strategie- und Positionspapier Cyber-Sicherheit 2020: Herausforderungen für die IT-Sicherheitsforschung
    ( 2014)
    Neugebauer, Reimund
    ;
    Jarke, M.
    ;
    Thoma, K.
    Datensicherheit ist in aller Munde - das Bewusstsein um die Relevanz dieser Thematik und die damit verbundene Erwartungshaltung sind groß. Fraunhofer-Experten haben ihre Empfehlungen für eine starke IT-Nation Deutschland in einem Positionspapier zusammengefasst. Prof. Dr. Reimund Neugebauer, Präsident der Fraunhofer-Gesellschaft, überreichte es auf der CeBIT an Prof. Dr. Johanna Wanka, Bundesministerin für Bildung und Forschung, und Dr. Thomas de Maizière, Bundesminister des Innern.
  • Publication
    Monitoring security compliance of critical processes
    ( 2014)
    Rieke, R.
    ;
    Repp, J.
    ;
    Zhdanova, M.
    ;
    Eichler, J.
    Enforcing security in process-aware information systems at runtime requires the monitoring of systems' operation using process information. Analysis of this information with respect to security and compliance aspects is growing in complexity with the increase in functionality, connectivity, and dynamics of process evolution. To tackle this complexity, the application of models is becoming standard practice. Considering today's frequent changes to processes, model-based support for security and compliance analysis is not only needed in pre-operational phases but also at runtime. This paper presents an approach to support evaluation of the security status of processes at runtime. The approach is based on operational formal models derived from process specifications and security policies comprising technical, organizational, regulatory and cross-layer aspects. A process behavior model is synchronized by events from the running process and utilizes prediction of expected cl ose-future states to find possible security violations and allow early decisions on countermeasures. The applicability of the approach is exemplified by a misuse case scenario from a hydroelectric power plant.
  • Publication
    Threat model based security evaluation of open connectivity services
    ( 2013)
    Schoo, P.
    ;
    Marx, R.
    Open Connectivity Services (OConS) is a new approach for an improved control of connectivity and services on the level of physical or data link, routing and transport, flow and session control. The approach builds on the principles of open networking and access to open control interfaces. One characteristics of the OConS approach is that the control implementation are foreseen as distributable components that can be spread and deployed over computing nodes. To enable the necessary and suitable security and privacy protection addressing misuse, availability obstacles and to identify potential privacy issues, this paper contributes a threat analysis on OConS.
  • Publication
    Security architecture for cloud networking
    ( 2012)
    Fusenig, V.
    ;
    Sharma, A.
    Cloud computing offers reduced capital expenditure, operational risks, complexity and maintenance, and increased scalability while providing services at different abstraction levels, namely Software-as-a-Service (SaaS), Platform-as-a-Service (PaaS), and Infrastructure-as-a-Service (IaaS). A new approach called cloud networking adds networking functionalities to cloud computing and enables dynamic and flexible placement of virtual resources crossing provider borders. This allows various kinds of optimization, e.g., reducing latency or network load. However, this approach introduces new security challenges. This paper presents a security architecture that enables a user of cloud networking to define security requirements and enforce them in the cloud networking infrastructure.