MLS-PCA: a high assurance security architecture for future avionics

Abstract

DOD Joint Vision 2020 (JV2020) is the integrated multiservice planning document for conduct among coalition forces of future warfare. It requires the confluence of a number of key avionics technical developments: integrating the network-centric battlefield, management of hundred thousands of distributed processors, high assurance multilevel security (MLS) in the battlefield, and low cost high assurance engineering. We describe the results of a study and modeling of a new security architecture, (MLS-PCA), that yields a practical solution for JV2020 based upon DARPA polymorphic computing architecture (PCA) advances, and a new distributed process-level encryption scheme. We define a functional model and a verified formal specification of MLS-PCA, for high assurance, with the constraints PCA software and hardware morphware must support. Also, we show a viable mapping of the MLS-PCA model to the PCA hardware. MLS-PCA is designed to support upwards of 500,000 CPUs predicted by Moore's law to be available circa 2020. To test such speculation, we conclude with a description of an in-progress proof-of-concept implementation of MLS-PCA using a 100-node grid computing system and an MLS distributed targeting application.