Tag Archive for: Purdue

Purdue building better cybersecurity for ransomware | News


WEST LAFAYETTE, Ind. (WLFI) — A growing number of Russian cyberattacks have targeted businesses, schools and federal agencies in the U.S. The Department of Defense is putting pressure on software producers to be more transparent about what is inside their products.

Many of these hacks stem from software operators and service providers not knowing the specifics of what is in their infrastructure, making it harder to determine what the problem is during an attack.

Santiago Torres-Arias, an assistant professor of electrical and computer engineering at Purdue University, said that it is near impossible to create hack-proof software.

Because of this, he believes better processes and tools need to be developed to minimize damage when cyberattacks happen.

“Software doesn’t follow the same quality standards that other critical services and products such as say food or medicine.  As we see, this compromises surface, we’re starting to identify software equality as the crucial point in the general supply chain,” said Torres-Arias.

Click HERE to learn more about Purdue’s research into cyber defense.

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Purdue researchers create ‘self-aware’ algorithm to ward off hacking attempts


WEST LAFAYETTE, Ind. — It sounds like a scene from a spy thriller. An attacker gets through the IT defenses of a nuclear power plant and feeds it fake, realistic data, tricking its computer systems and personnel into thinking operations are normal. The attacker then disrupts the function of key plant machinery, causing it to misperform or break down. By the time system operators realize they’ve been duped, it’s too late, with catastrophic results.

The scenario isn’t fictional; it happened in 2010, when the Stuxnet virus was used to damage nuclear centrifuges in Iran. And as ransomware and other cyberattacks around the world increase, system operators worry more about these sophisticated “false data injection” strikes. In the wrong hands, the computer models and data analytics – based on artificial intelligence – that ensure smooth operation of today’s electric grids, manufacturing facilities, and power plants could be turned against themselves.

abdel-kahlik-groupPurdue researchers have developed a novel self-cognizant and healing technology for industrial control systems against both internal and external threats. The project is led by Hany Abdel-Khalik (center) with Yeni Li, a nuclear engineering postdoctoral associate (right) leading the anomaly detection work and third-year nuclear engineering Ph.D. student, Arvind Sundaram, the covert cognizance algorithms implementation. (Purdue University photo/Vincent Walter)
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Purdue University’s Hany Abdel-Khalik has come up with a powerful response: to make the computer models that run these cyberphysical systems both self-aware and self-healing. Using the background noise within these systems’ data streams, Abdel-Khalik and his students embed invisible, ever-changing, one-time-use signals that turn passive components into active watchers. Even if an attacker is armed with a perfect duplicate of a system’s model, any attempt to introduce falsified data will be immediately detected and rejected by the system itself, requiring no human response.

“We call it covert cognizance,” said Abdel-Khalik, an associate professor…

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Purdue awarded $1M for info security study – Indianapolis Star

University officials say the two-year award will provide funding for students in master’s degree programs in either computer science or information security. It also will fund student research with the Center for Education and Research in Information …
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