LIFO laboratory

Orléans Computer Science Laboratory

The Systems Distribution and Security (SDS) team attached to the Orléans Computer Science Laboratory (LIFO) is based at the INSA Centre Val de Loire. Three themes are delved into on the subject of cybersecurity research, in direct link with the course taught at the Information Technology and Cybersecurity (STI) department.

Systems security

The team is looking into how to improve the security of operating systems, particularly Linux and Windows, to protect them from attacks from malicious users.
To that end, the team endeavours to maintain such security properties as integrity or confidentiality by analysing the various actions carried out by users. The central project PIGA (Policy Interaction Graph Analysis) implements security models defined by the security manager right within the core of operating systems. The team's efforts have certainly paid off, reaping rewards during both the National Research Agency (ANR) secure operating system challenge and the OSEO competition.

Security of distributed systems

This theme follows on naturally from the previous one.
Il s'intéresse à la sécurité dans des systèmes où les informations et/ou les calculs sont localisés à différents endroits. Les contextes d'utilisation sont variés. Ils vont des processeurs nouvelle génération ayant plusieurs coeurs aux clusters de calcul. La montée en puissance du cloud computing est une évolution naturelle du calcul réparti : l'utilisateur confie ses données et ses calculs au cloud et souhaite en garantir la sécurité. Le projet européen Seed4C a pour ambition d'ajouter la sécurité nécessaire à ces nouveaux systèmes.

Software security

This theme concerns the security of applications themselves.
The team is particularly turning its attention to applications whose behaviour can be changed by a hacker. From this point of view, several behaviours may be called for depending on the context. For embedded systems such as those in a smart card, the desired response – should there be an attack – is that the card is destroyed, thereby automatically preventing the hacker from getting hold of confidential information. The LYRICS project run by the ANR has been setup to study this issue on Android systems that use the emerging technology of contactless, or near-field communication (NFC).