Speaker : Prof. Sivakumar, IIT Bombay
Topic : Internet Security and Cryptographic Protocols
Date : 27th May 2002
Venue : Curtin University of Technology, Perth
Abstract : Internet's uncontrolled growth, and the increasing dependence on it by many commercial organizations, has made it a very critical but also a very vulnerable infrastructure. In this talk, we will start with an overview of security requirements (such as privacy, integrty, authenticity), threats (sniffing, spoofing, denial of services) and vulnerabilities (virus, Trojan Horse, buffer overflows). We will then separate the three main components of security--- Data security, System security and Transmission/Network Security and present useful defence mechanisms used at each layer.
At the heart of most defence mechanisms are Cryptographic protocols, which are security related interactions for reaching agreement between two or more principals, for example for authentication and key distribution. Such protocols are usually described by alternate transmission and receipt of (encrypted) messages in pre-defined format and sequence between principals. We will conclude by introducing several logics that have been proposed to model cryptographic protocols and corresponding proof techniques used to prove properties of the protocol such as vulnerability to attack by interception or spoofing of messages.
LECTURE 2
Speaker : Prof. Sivakumar, IIT Bombay
Topic : Internet Security and Cryptographic Protocols
Date : 28th May 2002
Venue : University of Adelaide, Adelaide
LECTURE 3
Speaker : Prof. Sivakumar, IIT Bombay
Topic : Internet Security and Cryptographic Protocols
Date : 30th May 2002
Venue : RMIT, Melbourne
LECTURE 4
Speaker : Prof. Sivakumar, IIT Bombay
Topic : Internet Security and Cryptographic Protocols
Date : 30th May 2002
Venue : University of Technolgy, Sydney
LECTURE 5
Speaker : Prof. Sivakumar, IIT Bombay
Topic : Formal Methods for Verification of Real-time Reactive Systems
Date : 5th June 2002
Venue : University of Auckland, Auckland, NZ
Abstract : Many applications such as computer based control systems used in nuclear reactors, space, avionics, process-control and robotics are safety-critical. Dramatic examples of catastrophic consequences of even minor bugs in such applications are many, including well known ones such as Ariane 5 failure, Mars Path finder problem and the Pentium bug.
This talk will start with a broad survey of the issues and state of the art in the verification of real-time reactive systems using examples from the work being done at the Centre for Formal Design and Verification of Software at IIT Bombay. We will then focus on the need for inductive proofs and introduce how equational logic and rewrite systems are particularly suited for this. We will conclude with illustrative examples of proofs of properties of some communication and security protocols using equational methods.
LECTURE 6
Speaker : Prof. Sivakumar, IIT Bombay
Topic : Internet Security and Cryptographic Protocols
Date : 5th June 2002
Venue : Canterbury University, Christchurch, New Zealand
LECTURE 7
Speaker : Prof. Sivakumar, IIT Bombay
Topic : Formal Methods for Verification of Real-time Reactive Systems
Date : 5th June 2002 Venue : Canterbury University, Christchurch, New Zealand
LECTURE 8
Speaker : Mr. R. Muralidharan, SMIEEE, OSS Systems (India) Pvt. Ltd., Mumbai, India
Topic : Integrated Access for Optical Networks : Issues and Challenges
Date : 14th August 2002
Venue : IEEE Victoria Section, Canada
Abstract : Integrated access for various services at the edge of an optical network, including issues and challenges involved are discussed. Optical networking is a technology for carrying very high volumes of data, voice, video services etc on multiple wavelengths of light. While the voice traffic is characterized by predictable growth and low-bandwidth requirements, data traffic has shown unpredictable growth and high bandwidth requirements. The Internet, private IP networks and other data intensive applications have shown exponential growth. This has increased the demand for high-speed capacity within the network. The data network traffic doubling every 6 months, service providers have expanded their networks fourfold over the last four years, whereas long-distance providers have grown their networks by seven times. Much of the added capacity has been in optical networking. With the rapid growth of first generation data networks, such as Frame Relay, IP and ATM, the underlying SONET/SDH network has served as the transmission medium for overlay data traffic as well as voice. At the edge of the optical network, SONET/SDH network equipment act as integrated access devices (IAD) and groom multiple low-speed data/voice/video circuits into a single highspeed optical stream. With extensive management functionality built into the protocol, SONET/SDH is the layer that today provides the service creation, fault management and restoration capabilities. One of the important points in optical networking is to convert data/voice into optical format as early as possible, at the edge of the network, and keep it optical as it passes through the network. Inherently, the SONET/SDH architecture is designed for voice traffic and hence there are many issues related to providing integrated services in the optical network. Issues such as Quality of service (QoS), bandwidth provisioning, dynamic provisioning, wire speed data processing, differentiated services etc need to be addressed. Hardware software co-design methodology is best suited for realizing such hard real time systems that need to operate at wire speed for data rates reaching gigabits. Aggregation of data channels involve processing incoming channel packets and encapsulating them into PPP/MP frames in real time. The payload received from the optical side needs to be demultiplexed and mapped onto an appropriate slow speed interface. The Access systems are designed to be Managed objects and they can be managed by a global Network Manager such as HP Open View. For this the access nodes need to have SNMP/CMIP agents as well as SONET DCC with TL1 stacks. The architecture of the system with appropriate delegation of tasks to achieve real time data transport at Gigabit speeds is a challenge.
