How secure is our networked world?

We are currently experiencing the digital transformation of our economy and society. This fundamental change is accompanied by extensive digitization and networking in all areas, creating a world in which the previous separation between off - and online no longer predominates. The physical world is merging with the digital world.
This presents many new opportunities and possibilities, but also an equal number of challenges and risks.

ICT security in particular can no longer rely solely on established models and solution strategies. The trinity of privacy, integrity, and availability as the fundamental base of IT-Security must be reconsidered and revised to fit the new global cyberworld. In the networked world, previously self-suffi cient systems have suddenly become elements of a global "system of systems". The fusion of heterogeneous application systems increases the number of targets for cyberattacks and their harmful effects. Security gaps in soft- and hardware represent one of the biggest challenges, since they are deeply rooted in these systems’ own development histories. Over and above this, the deep integration of, and high level of interdependency between, ICT and physical systems present new areas for attack, for which innovative defense concepts are hard to find.

The discovery of the ›Meltdown‹ hardware gap, that can be exploited using the ›Spectre‹ attack scenario,  illustrated that full protection against cyber-attacks can never be guaranteed. Such gaps in security as these serious processor errors often remain undiscovered for years, during which time they can be exploited by attackers. A further problematic issue is soft- and hardware components that use outdated security solutions that, in addition to this, were often never intended to be used within a system of systems. These solutions often lack basic options for retrospective back-ups, such as patch management. Security experts have thus been giving warnings about inadequate quality control in the Internet of Things for many years now. The fight for market share often comes at the cost of product security, in turn often first made possible by the lack of quality control standards.

The Cyber-Resilient Architectures and Security competence cluster is addressing these challenges, answering them with a four-point model that makes systems robust, stable, and adjustable when faced with flexible, cooperative, intelligently acting attackers:

 

• A state-of-the-art security architecture for end-point and communications security provides the basis.
• A resilience architecture mitigates the eff ects and scope of impact of attacks.
• Metrics, methods, processes, and standards to measurably and verifiably secure the elements of these architectures and their interaction in development, evolution, and implementation.
• Usability and controllability of key user interfaces despite increasing system complexity.

Employees of the Competence Cluster

Thomas Strathmann: Model-based safety and security
Michael Brand: Trust models and anomaly detection
Björn Siemers: Incidence response and attack technologies