G Cybenko, S Jajodia, MP Wellman, and P Liu

In: Prakash A., Shyamasundar R. (eds) Information Systems Security. ICISS 2014. Lecture Notes in Computer Science, vol 8880. Springer.

Abstract

Today’s cyber defenses are largely static. They are governed by slow deliberative processes involving testing, security patch deployment, and human-in-the-loop monitoring. As a result, adversaries can systematically probe target networks, pre-plan their attacks, and ultimately persist for long times inside compromised networks and hosts. A new class of technologies, called Adaptive Cyber Defense (ACD), is being developed that presents adversaries with optimally changing attack surfaces and system configurations, forcing adversaries to continually re-assess and re-plan their cyber operations. Although these approaches (e.g., moving target defense, dynamic diversity, and bio-inspired defense) are promising, they assume stationary and stochastic, but non-adversarial, environments. To realize the full potential, we need to build the scientific foundations so that system resiliency and robustness in adversarial settings can be rigorously defined, quantified, measured, and extrapolated in a rigorous and reliable manner.

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