Abstract

Traditional cybersecurity has focused on techniques to analyze and eliminate vulnerabilities in a network, often in response to actual security breaches of previously unknown weaknesses. A key desired capability is to be able to accomplish a mission even while the network is compromised and subject to deception. This project investigated a new framework for representing models of mission goals and tasks, and to exploit those models to make a mission more robust to deception operations co-occurring in the network. These mission-centered network models MCNMs build on and extend current two-layered logicalphysical network models by integrating a new layer of task-level representations of the mission into those models. In this new task-oriented layer, a mission can be characterized as a set of goals, each accomplished by a set of interdependent tasks that place requirements on the network resources. The system can then dynamically control the mappings of those tasks onto network resources using a variety of algorithms that take into account which resources are currently compromised. As a result, a mission can be protected from ongoing intrusion and deception activities by dynamically reallocating resources as they become compromised.

Date

September 29, 2015

Authors

Yolanda Gil

Issue

AFRLOSRVATR20150303