Security Policy Synthesis in Mobile Systems

Abstract

Contemporary mobile devices have become universal and versatile tools that increasingly are used in sensitive application scenarios. They inevitably carry confidential information such as passwords, encryption keys, mission-critical company data, or location information in combat areas. In order to meet sophisticated security requirements, recent technology focuses on policy-oriented approaches that allow for the definition and enforcement of rigorous and precise rules for protecting confidential information. State-of-the-art development of security policies is a critical process, because of the involved quality assurance measures, it is quite heavy-weighted and tends to antagonize the distinguished virtues of mobile devices for lightweight, spontaneous communication and cooperation. This paper presents an approach to support secure, mobile device based cooperation in temporary, sporadically and spontaneously fashioned cliques within open communication infrastructures. The approach is based upon light-weight security domains protected by security policies that are dynamically and automatically composed during group formation. Due to the volatile nature of such groups simplicity, adaptability, efficiency and compatibility with today's security policy implementation techniques have been a major design goal.