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Programmable Logic Controllers (PLCs) are pivotal in Critical Infrastructures (CIs) and Industrial Control Systems (ICSs), governing processes in nuclear power plants, petrochemical factories, and water treatment systems. Despite their importance, PLCs are vulnerable to security threats, notably control logic injection attacks, aiming to sabotage physical processes. This thesis delves into PLC security, analyzing vulnerabilities in non-cryptographically and cryptographically protected PLCs, particularly Siemens S7-300 and S7-1500 models.
Siemens, an automation market leader, utilizes S7-300 PLCs in millions of applications, reflecting the broader ICS security landscape. The S7-1500 line claims resistance to cyberattacks, including control logic injections. The thesis evaluates authentication in non-cryptographically protected PLCs, introducing a stealthy control logic injection attack scenario using an S7-300 PLC and S7Comm protocol.
The second part explores integrity checks in cryptographically protected S7-1500 PLCs. Findings, encompassing disclosed vulnerabilities, lead to a severe control logic injection attack with a malicious interrupt block, conducted in an industrial setting using the S7-1500 and S7CommPlus protocol.
The final segment focuses on Profinet protocol security and an injection attack scenario. The study demonstrates adversaries manipulating critical data without prior knowledge, causing harm to physical processes. A real-world attack on a Profinet-based system with two S7-300 PLCs is executed.
The thesis concludes by proposing mitigation solutions, enhancing PLC and communication protocol security. This contribution elevates the security posture of millions of operating devices globally, advancing PLC security research.
Die Anwendung asymmetrischer Kryptosysteme, z.B. elliptische Kurven Kryptographie (ECC), erfordert große Rechenkapazität die normalerweise auf von mobilen Geräten bzw. drahtlosen Sensorknoten nicht zur Verfügung steht. Die Implementierung der ECC in Hardware reduziert den Zeit- und Energie-Aufwand. Die Optimierung der Hardware-Implementierungen dient nicht nur der weiteren Reduktion des Zeit- und Energieverbrauches sondern hilft darüber hinaus die Herstellungskosten zu verringern, so dass solche Lösungen auch für kostengünstige Geräte einsetzbar werden. Im Rahmen dieser Dissertation wurden Optimierungsmöglichkeiten für die Multiplikation der Polynome, die für EC-Operationen eingesetzt werden, untersucht. Ziel der Optimierungen war, dass die Multiplikation mit einer minimalen Anzahl von Additionen (also XOR-Gattern) und Multiplikationen (also AND-Gattern) durchgeführt werden kann. Im Rahmen dieser Arbeit wurde die iterative Bearbeitung von 10 Multiplikations-Methoden (MM) im Gegensatz zur üblichen rekursiven Bearbeitung untersucht. Dabei wurde eine Reihenfolge der Operationen für jede der untersuchten MM ermittelt, die zu einer reduzierten Anzahl von XOR-Operationen führt. Der Einsatz der optimierten Reihenfolge kann die Komplexität der MM wesentlich reduzieren. Zum Beispiel bei der generalisierten Karatsuba-MM [18] beträgt die Reduktion des XOR-Aufwandes durchschnittlich 39 % für Polynom-Längen bis 600 Bits. Für die IHP 0,13μ-Technologie entspricht diese Reduktion des XOR-Aufwandes einer durchschnittlichen Flächen-Reduktion der Polynom-Multiplizierer um 35 %. Bei der 4-Segment-Karatsuba-MM wird nicht nur der XOR-Aufwand, sondern auch die Signal-Verzögerung im Vergleich zur rekursiven Anwendung der originalen Karatsuba-MM reduziert. Außerdem wurde ein Algorithmus zur Bestimmung einer flächen- und/oder energieoptimalen Kombination der Multiplikations-Methoden entwickelt. Mit dem vorgeschlagenen Algorithmus wurden die flächen- und die energie-optimalen Kombinationen der MM für Polynom-Längen bis 600 Bits bestimmt. Alle ECC-relevanten Polynom-Längen liegen in diesem Bereich. Die durchschnittliche Reduktion der Flächen im Vergleich zu den rekonstruierten Daten aus [30] beträgt 12 %. Zusätzlich wurde ein energieoptimaler serieller Mehr-Takt-Multiplizierer für 233-Bits Polynome auf Basis Karatsuba-ähnlicher Multiplikations-Methoden entwickelt. Dieser Multiplizierer nutzt die Winograd-MM und basiert auf einen flächenoptimierten 78-Bits-Teil-Multiplizierer. Die theoretischen Ergebnisse wurden mit Hilfe von Synthesedaten für die IHP Technologie erfolgreich verifiziert. Der Energieverbrauch und die Ausführungszeit des Designs sind um 24 % bzw. 28 % kleiner als die des Vergleichsdesigns aus [28].
This work addresses tough challenges of sensor network applications with Quality of Service requirements. That is, nodes must work with batteries for a long time, support short end-to-end delays and robust communication in multi-hop networks. It starts with presenting previous research efforts that address such challenges. For instance, many Medium Access Control (MAC) protocols keep nodes mostly sleeping to save energy and synchronize wake-up times for communication. Although such protocols offer short end-to-end delays, they still suffer from long idle listening and shortened lifetimes. The main reasons are the long time needed to detect an idle channel and inefficient ways of dealing with clock drift. This work introduces novel solutions to these problems, mainly at Layer 2 of the OSI model, that significantly reduce idle listening. First, nodes predict future drift and reduce the time needed to compensate clock uncertainty among neighbors. Second, they quickly detect an idle channel and power down the transceiver. In some scenarios, nodes work 30% longer owing to these solutions. To tackle problems with unreliable wireless links, sensor nodes may apply various solutions at Layer 2. For example, with Automatic Repeat reQuest (ARQ) protocol they send retries on frame losses, resulting in extra energy consumption. This work examines the impact of ARQ on the lifetime and on the reception rate. Several indoor and outdoor experiments showed that with only 1-2 retries nodes can handle many communication problems. Besides, owing to the idle-listening reduction, mentioned previously, ARQ shortens the lifetime by 10% only. Although this work addresses particular applications, the solutions presented here can be used in other scenarios and with different protocols. For instance, the energy-efficient drift compensation approach can be directly used in any schedule-based MAC protocols, like the one based on the IEEE 802.15.4 standard. Besides, any protocol can benefit from the solution to the idle-listening reduction based on the early detection of idle channel. Finally, owing to the analytical model that estimates the lifetime of nodes, researches and developers can early evaluate MAC protocols running on various hardware platforms.
Das Internet der Dinge (IoT) und drahtlose Sensor-Netzwerke (WSNs) sind grundlegende Konzepte für die Vernetzung der heutigen globalen Informationsgesellschaft, die auf kleinen drahtlosen Geräten basiert. Wenn die Funktionalitäten oder Daten dieser Geräte manipuliert werden, kann der potenzielle Schaden erheblich sein. Daher ist die Sicherung der Datenübertragung zwischen diesen Geräten mithilfe von Kryptografie entscheidend. Die Sicherheit kryptografischer Algorithmen hängt jedoch von der Geheimhaltung der kryptografischen Schlüssel ab, die aufgrund der physischen Zugänglichkeit anfällig sein können. Side-Channel-Angriffe können diese Anfälligkeit ausnutzen, indem sie physikalische Parameter nutzen, die mit dem Betrieb kryptografischer Chips verbunden sind, wie z. B. die elektromagnetische Strahlung während kryptografischer Operationen.Als Antwort auf diese Herausforderung wurde in dieser Arbeit das "Leakage Source Cartography Tool" (LSC-Tool) entwickelt, um die Analyse der elektromagnetischen Strahlung in den elliptischen Kurvenkryptografie-Designs des IHP zu beschleunigen. Das LSC-Tool ermöglicht die automatisierte Auswertung von Sätzen von elektromagnetischen Traces, die aus verschiedenen Messpositionen über einen kryptografischen Chip gewonnen wurden. Die Analyse führt zu einer "Leakage Source Map" (LS-Map), die den Erfolg von elektromagnetischen Analyseangriffen an jeder Messposition darstellt. Dieses Tool bietet eine kostengünstige und schnelle Möglichkeit, die Widerstandsfähigkeit kryptografischer Designs gegen Angriffe zu bewerten, und bietet Designern Einblicke in die anfälligsten Bereiche des Chips sowie Informationen über den Leakage pro Taktzyklus.Durch den Einsatz des LSC-Tools wurde der Widerstand von zwei IHP ECC-Designs gegen horizontale differentielle elektromagnetische Analyseangriffe an 25 Messpositionen getestet. Die statistische Analyse von Traces kann mit drei Methoden durchgeführt werden: der Methode der kleinsten Quadrate, dem Difference-of-means-Test oder der Difference-of-the-mean-Methode. Die generierten LS-Maps zeigen, dass die Verwendung unterschiedlicher Methoden unterschiedliche Anzeichen für Leakagestellen liefert. Die Kombination dieser Karten erhöht die Erfolgsrate des Angriffs. Beachtenswert ist, dass im Laufe dieser Forschung klar wurde, dass das LSC-Tool angepasst werden kann, um LS-Maps für die funktionellen Blöcke von ECC-Designs zu erstellen und so die Analyse simulierter Power-Traces für das IHP ECC-Designs zu ermöglichen.
This thesis deals with strategies for achieving high data throughput in wireless sensor networks that use a time division multiple access (TDMA) scheme to resolve medium access. The thesis uses a multi-sided approach that deals not only with the scheduling algorithm but also with the network layer and the interference model. The thesis proposes four solutions that significantly improve data throughput, fairness, and latency in the considered scenario.
The thesis starts with an overview of state-of-the-art medium access control (MAC) protocols, emphasizing TDMA. Based on this overview, it is concluded that not much space for improvement is left in the field of schedule calculation algorithms; many such algorithms are proposed up to date, and they can achieve schedule lengths close to the theoretical minimum. However, the research also reveals a lack of in-detail evaluation and comparison of these algorithms; this makes choosing the most suitable algorithm for a particular application hard and performance estimation inaccurate. Therefore, an extensive evaluation of state-of-the-art TDMA protocols using simulations and over 200 randomly generated networks was performed to tackle this issue. The results allow choosing an appropriate algorithm and estimating performance for each specific application.
Next, the problem of multiple packet transmissions during a single time slot is analyzed. State-of-the-art TDMA protocols assume that one packet can be transmitted in each slot and optimize the number of slots each node gets under this assumption. However, when nodes can transmit more than one packet, the performance of such a schedule is impaired. To solve this, the M-TreeMAC protocol is proposed; this protocol considers the actual number of packets transmitted in a time slot and optimizes the schedule accordingly. Furthermore, it is observed that the routing topology heavily impacts the schedule length created using this algorithm; an algorithm that optimizes the topology to result in the shortest schedule when M-TreeMAC is used is proposed, increasing benefits even further.
Finally, the accuracy of the 2-hop interference model, commonly used by state-of-the-art TDMA scheduling algorithms, is studied and simulated using a realistic radio model based on measurement results. The results show high packet loss ratios for packets traveling a large number of hops to reach the sink. The adaptive interference model is proposed to improve the 2-hop interference model. The proposed model can increase throughput significantly in networks with a height of ten or more hops.
Mathematically, cryptographic approaches are secure. This means that the time an attacker needs for finding the secret by brute forcing these approaches is about the time of the existence of our world. Practically, an algorithm implemented in hardware is a device that generates a lot of additional data during the calculation process. Its power consumption, electromagnetic radiation, etc. can be measured, saved and analysed for key extraction. Such attacks are called side channel analysis attacks and are significant threats when applying cryptographic algorithms. By considering these attacks when implementing a cryptographic algorithm, it is possible to design an implementation that is more resistant against them.
The goal of this thesis was to design a methodology to securely implement the Montgomery kP-operation using an IHP implementation as a starting point. In addition, the area and energy consumption of the secure Montgomery kP-multiplier should still be highly efficient. The resistance against power analysis attacks of two different IHP ECC implementations was analysed in this thesis. A horizontal power analysis attack using the difference-of-means test was performed with the goal of finding potential leakage sources exploited in side channel analysis attacks, i.e. finding the reasons of a correct extraction of the cryptographic key. For both analysed ECC designs, four key candidates were extracted with a correctness of 90% or more. Through analysis of the implemented Montgomery kP-algorithm’s functionality and its power consumption, it was established that the algorithm’s operation execution flow was the main cause of the implementations’ vulnerability. Thus, a design methodology consisting in changing the Montgomery kP-algorithm operation flow was developed. As a result, the re-designed implementations do not deliver any correctly extracted key candidates whenever the difference-of-means test is performed on them. These re-designs implied an increase on the chip area by about 5% for each implementation. The execution time needed for performing a complete kP-operation was reduced for both designs. Thereby one implementation’s execution time was reduced by 12% in comparison to its original version and even though its power consumption was increased by 9%, its energy consumption per kP-operation was reduced by 4.5%.
On the applicability of short key asymmetric cryptography in low power wireless sensor networks
(2016)
The growing popularity of Wireless Sensor Networks (WSN) makes the spectrum of their applications very wide. A great number of the application areas like health monitoring or military applications require a high level of security and dependability from the wireless sensor network. Solving these issues can be supported by providing cryptographic solutions into WSN applications. Since the WSNs mainly consist of low power devices, cryptographic solutions ideal for WSNs should provide computationally lightweight security mechanisms producing small data packets and ensuring confidentiality. Cryptographic mechanisms that have both these features are considered in this thesis, which main objective is the analysis of the applicability of the short key elliptic curve cryptography in WSN environments. Reduced key lengths require modification of the standard ECC security algorithms to provide authentication and also a novel solution for a cryptographic secure pseudo-random number generator. The proposed solution is based on the standard ECC, but it differs in several aspects. The main difference is that the parameters of the used elliptic curve have to be kept secret. This is due to the fact that solving the Discreet Logarithm Problem (DLP) for such short parameters can be done in short time. Additionally, using shorter parameters for the underlying elliptic curves excludes also the use of standard hash functions, what mainly influences the mechanisms for generating the digital signature. Hash functions require large input values and produce relatively large output data that is inapplicable in the shortECC environment. Thus, within this thesis a modified version of standard Elliptic Curves Digital Signature Algorithm is proposed, which does not require any hash function. The shortECC needs pseudo-random numbers in the encryption and the digital signature protocols, but since it operates on numbers that are significantly shorter than the ones used by other cryptographic approaches, pseudo-random number generators for standard approaches are not suitable for shortECC. Thus, the new pseudo-random number generator not involving any additional hardware besides the modules available on the used test platform and operating on 32-bit long integers, is proposed. The randomness of the numbers generated by the proposed algorithm and their applicability for cryptographic purposes was evaluated using the NIST test suites. The shortECC approach was also subjected to cryptanalysis in order to proof its security and determine the circumstances and constraints for its application.
With the introduction of the Internet at the end of the last century the modern society was fundamentally changed. Computer systems became an element of nearly all parts of our daily live. Due to the interconnection of these systems local borders are mostly vanished, so that information is accessible and exchangeable anywhere and at anytime. But this increased connectivity causes that physical fences are no longer an adequate protection for computer systems. Whereas the security of commodity computer systems was improved continuously and similarly with their increased connectivity, deeply embedded systems were then and now mostly protected by physical fences. But the ubiquitous availability of embedded systems in personal and commercial environments makes these systems likewise accessible and moves them strongly into the focus of security investigations.
Deeply embedded systems are usually equipped with tiny scale micro controllers, which are limited in their available resources and do not feature secure mechanisms to isolate system resources. Hence, a single error in a local software component is not limited to the component itself, instead the complete system may be influenced. The lack of resource isolation makes tiny scale systems prone for accidental errors but in particular vulnerable for a broad variety of malicious software. For a safe and secure operation of computer systems it is strongly recommended that software components are isolated in such a manner that they have access only to those resources, which are assigned to them. Even though a substantial number of approaches in the context of embedded system’s safety were investigated during the last fifteen years, security was mostly neglected.
This thesis is focused on security aspects where malicious software wittingly tries to bypass available protection mechanisms. The thesis introduces a security platform for tiny scale systems that enforces an isolation of software components considering security aspects. Due to the limited resources of tiny scale systems the proposed solution is based on a co-design process that takes the static and predefined nature of deeply embedded systems into account and includes hardware, compile-time, and run-time partitions to reduce the number of additional run-time components, to avoid performance drawbacks, and to minimize the memory as well as the components footprint overhead. To prove the applicability of the presented platform it was applied and evaluated with two real applications. In addition, an investigation of technologies of commodity computer systems that are suitable to build secure systems is presented. The thesis analyzes their enforcement based on the features provided by the introduced security platform. The contributions of this thesis include an enforcement of a security isolation of system resources on tiny scale systems and enable the development of a broad variety of secure tiny scale system applications.
Serverless computing, particularly its Function-as-a-Service (FaaS) offering, has emerged as a prominent cloud computing model empowering developers to craft event-driven applications by deploying custom application logic in an ephemeral runtime environment. This model abstracts away the underlying infrastructure complexities and management overhead, offering key benefits such as Pay-As-You-Go (PAYG) billing and automated scalability. Although Real-Time (RT) extensions to FaaS (RT-FaaS) have been proposed for realizing the functional requirements of industrial automation virtualization use cases, these architectures introduce distinct security challenges that generic security mechanisms cannot fully address. As a result, RT-FaaS platforms remain vulnerable to both internal and external threats and a variety of exploitation vectors that can compromise the Confidentiality, Integrity and Availability (CIA) security properties of such a platform.
The aim of this thesis is to assess the core security requirements of a RT-FaaS platform by evaluating potential vulnerabilities and risks within this environment. We further propose specifically tailored mitigation mechanisms based on the extended Berkeley Packet Filter (eBPF) and cryptographic digital signatures for a RT-FaaS platform with a WebAssembly (WASM) runtime to enhance its resilience without imposing prohibitive performance overheads. Key areas of focus for this work include RT-FaaS runtime isolation, continuous security enforcement and data protection.
We evaluated the proposed security mitigation mechanisms on the platform accounting for both effectiveness and performance. By doing so, we discuss the trade-offs between the stringent security requirements and maintaining predictable, low-latency execution essential for industrial automation use cases. While we observed some considerable jitter and latency overheads on the secure RT-FaaS platform, these did not significantly impact the functional performance of the platform. Hence adopting serverless computing for RT industrial automation use cases is feasible while ensuring robust function, system and network security.
Privacy issues are becoming more and more important, especially since the cyber and the real world are converging up to certain extent when using mobile devices. Means that really protect privacy are still missing. The problem is, as soon as a user provides data to a service provider the user looses control over her/his data. The simple solution is not to provide any data but then many useful services, e.g., navigation applications, cannot be used. The dissertation addresses two aspects of privacy protection. The first aspect regards not producing private information if possible. Such unnecessary information are traces of access controlled service uses. Hence, one approach in this dissertation enables k-anonymous authorization for services uses. It equips the users of the system with trusted pseudonymous certificates reflecting their respective authorizations. Analogous to anonymous e-cash, the certificates are issued by a trusted authority with knowledge of the actual authorizations of an identified user. The certificates can be verified by any service supported by the trusted authority but without knowledge of the user’s identity. Not even the issuing authority is able to reveal the users identity from the pseudonym of a certificate. Hence, service usage cannot be tracked, neither by the service nor by the authority. This protects the privacy of service usage behavior of users. The second aspect of privacy protection is to remain in control over private data released to others. Temporary release of private data is essential to context-sensitive services, which rely on these context data to provide or improve added value. Therefore, the dissertation designs a Privacy Guaranteeing Execution Container (PGEC), which enables applications to access private user data and guarantees that the user data is deleted as soon as the service or application is finished. Basically, the concept is that the application obtains access to the user data in a specially protected and certified environment, the PGEC. The PGEC also restricts the communication between the application and the service provider to what is explicitly allowed by the service user. In addition to those means, the PGEC also implements countermeasures against malicious attacks such as modified host systems and covert channel attacks, which might be misusing CPU load to signal data out of the PGEC. Thus, the PGEC guarantees a “one time use” of the provided private data.
