A Taxonomy for Attack Patterns on Information Flows in Component-Based Operating Systems
This work addresses security vulnerabilities in multilevel secure operating systems, but it is incremental as it builds on existing concepts of information flow control.
The authors tackled the problem of preventing security breaches in component-based operating systems by developing a taxonomy and algebra for attack patterns on information flows, revealing a new type of covert physical channel that connects isolated partitions.
We present a taxonomy and an algebra for attack patterns on component-based operating systems. In a multilevel security scenario, where isolation of partitions containing data at different security classifications is the primary security goal and security breaches are mainly defined as undesired disclosure or modification of classified data, strict control of information flows is the ultimate goal. In order to prevent undesired information flows, we provide a classification of information flow types in a component-based operating system and, by this, possible patterns to attack the system. The systematic consideration of informations flows reveals a specific type of operating system covert channel, the covert physical channel, which connects two former isolated partitions by emitting physical signals into the computer's environment and receiving them at another interface.