MyThS

 

Models and Types for Security in Mobile Distributed Systems
Contract IST-2001-32617 (MyThS)

 



Funded by the Global Computing pro-active initiative (GC) of the Future and Emerging Technologies (FET).

 

University of Sussex, coordinator. (contact: Vladimiro Sassone <vs@susx.ac.uk>)
École Normale Supérieure (contact: Giuseppe Castagna <castagna@di.ens.fr>)
Università "Ca' Foscari" Venezia (contact: Michele Bugliesi <michele@dsi.unive.it>)

 

Objectives

MyThS seeks to develop type-based foundational theories of security for mobile and distributed systems. By relying on strong typing as the basic principle, MyThS addresses the foundations of programming languages and paradigms that allow static detection of security violations, and aims at developing type theoretic methods and tools that enable formal analyses of security guarantees appropriate for systems and applications on the global computing platform.

 

Workplan

The workplan of the project unfolds in three major themes: resource access control, information flow control, and analysis of cryptographic protocols. These are central, challenging themes for the global computing area, with far-reaching impact on the development of high-level, reliable, network-aware programming languages. Two notions will be pivotal throughout the themes: models and types. Based on high-level process calculi, MyThS will develop formal models for distributed and mobile code environments. Such models will be defined so as to address the diverse requirements for secure communication and mobility in open-ended networks with highly dynamic topologies, in which cryptography is a necessary prerequisite for security.

The fundamental vehicle for ensuring security will be provided by typing systems, intended both as prescriptive and descriptive tools, capable of constraining and characterising agents' behavious and interactions. They will be used to enforce and analyse security properties in each of our themes of investigation. By weaving together these hitherto independent contexts, MyThS will form a broad, coherent foundation for trustworthy communication in a global environment.

 

Expected Results

The absence of central coordination, typical of the global computing network, will be a fundamental challenge for typing, as agents will not be able to trust that network objects comply with any given set of rules. MyThS will make provision for type systems to cope with this, by amalgamating techniques for static typing with new mechanisms for decentralised (dynamic) type-checking of distributed computing sites and migrating agents. Strong typing will provide formal guarantees of resilience against intended or accidental violations, and thus lay the foundations for the design of robust, high-level programming paradigms for global computing.

MyThS will deliver an integrated set of type systems for innovative resource management and security policies, information flow analyses, and formal validation of distributed crypto-protocols, and establish rigorous design principles for secure and provably flawless systems.

 

Cluster: Analysys of Systems

Includes the following projects.
Dart: Dynamic assembly and reconfiguration
MRG: Mobile resources guarantees
MyThs: Models and types for security
Profundis: Proofs of functionality
Secure: Secure environment for collaboration
Mikado: Mobile calculi based on domains

 

Advisory Board