November 20, 2012 at 6:30 PM
ISSA National Capital Chapter November meeting topic:
Angelos Stavrou
Abstract:
Recent advances in the hardware capabilities of mobile hand-held devices have fostered the development of open source operating systems and a wealth of applications for mobile phones and table devices. This new generation of smart devices, including iPhone and Google Android, are powerful enough to accomplish most of the user tasks previously requiring a personal computer.
In this talk, Dr Stavrou will discuss the cyber threats that stem from these new smart device capabilities and the online application markets for mobile devices. These threats include malware, data exfiltration, exploitation through USB, and user and data tracking. We will present the ongoing GMU and NIST efforts to defend against or mitigate the impact of attacks against mobile devices. Our approach involve analyzing the source code and binaries of mobile applications, hardening the Android Kernel, using Kernel-level network and data encryption, and controlling the communication mechanisms for synchronizing the user contents with computers and other phones. Dr Stavrou will also explain the enhanced difficulties in dealing with these security issues when the end-goal is to deploy security-enhanced smart phones into military combat settings. The talk will conclude with a discussion of our current and future research directions.
About the speaker
Dr. Angelos Stavrou is an Associate Professor at George Mason University and the Associate Director Center for Secure Information Systems. Stavrou has served as principal investigator on contracts from NSF, DARPA, IARPA, AFOSR, ARO, ONR, and he is an active member of NIST's Mobile Security team and has written more than 40 peer-reviewed conference and journal articles. Stavrou received his M.Sc. in Electrical Engineering, M.Phil. and Ph.D. (with distinction) in Computer Science all from Columbia University. He also holds an M.Sc. in theoretical Computer Science from University of Athens, and a B.Sc. in Physics with distinction from University of Patras, Greece. His current research interests include security and reliability for distributed systems, security principles for virtualization, and anonymity with a focus on building and deploying large-scale systems. Stavrou was awarded with the 2012 George Mason Emerging Researcher, Scholar, Creator Award, a university-wide award. He is a member of the ACM, the IEEE, and USENIX.
Over the past few years, Dr. Stavrou's research has focused on two aspects of security: Systems' Security and Reliability. In the context of the first, he is working with NIST as part of the DARPA “Transformative Applications” project that involves securing Android mobile phone devices against kernel-level attacks. Furthermore, Stavrou is the GMU PI participating along with Columbia, Stanford, and Symantec in the IARPA “StoneSoup” effort. In addition, the PI is funded by DARPA under the CyberGenome project to perform analysis on the phylogenetic origins of malware. Dr. Stavrou is currently supported by a NSF Trustworthy Computing (NSF-CNS- 0915291) grant on “Scalable Malware Analysis using Lightweight Virtualization”. This effort seeks efficient methods to collect and analyze the nature of Internet malfeasance.
Please RSVP if you plan to attend.
Non-members are welcome without charge! Light refreshments will be served.
Tuesday, November 20, 2012 6:30 PM
Government Printing Office
Room A138
732 N. Capitol St.
Washington, DC, 20401
Click here for details
