Ph.D. Dissertation proposal

Creating a Collaborative Situational-Aware IDPS

Lisa Mathews

11:00am Tuesday, 10 June 2014, ITE 346

Traditional intrusion detection and prevention systems (IDPSs) have well known limitations that decrease their utility against many kinds of attacks. Current state-of-the-art IDPSs are point based solutions that perform a simple analysis of host or network data and then flag an alert. Only known attacks whose signatures have been identified and stored in some form can be discovered by most of these systems. They cannot detect “zero day” type attacks or attacks that use “low-and-slow” vectors. Many times an attack is only revealed by post facto forensics after some damage has already been done.

To address these issues, we are developing a semantic approach to intrusion detection that uses traditional as well non-traditional sensors collaboratively. Traditional sensors include hardware or software such as network scanners, host scanners, and IDPSs like Snort. Potential non-traditional sensors include open sources or information such as online forums, blogs, and vulnerability databases which contain textual descriptions of proposed attacks or discovered exploits. After analyzing the data streams from these sensors, the information extracted is added as facts to a knowledge base using a W3C standards based ontology that our group has developed. We have also developed rules/policies that can reason over the facts to identify the situation or context in which an attack can occur. By having different sources collaborate to discover potential security threats and create additional rules/policies, the resulting situational-aware IDPS is better equipped to stop creative attacks such as those that follow a low-and-slow intrusion pattern. Leveraging information from these heterogeneous sources leads to a more robust, situational-aware IDPS that is better equipped to detect complicated attacks. This will allow for detection in soft real time. We will create a prototype of this system and test the efficiency and accuracy of its ability to detect complex malware.

Committee: Drs. Anupam Joshi (Chair), Tim Finin, John Pinkston, Charles Nicholas, Claudia Pearce, Yul Williams

On June 6, 2014, UMBC President Freeman Hrabowski and U.S. Army Research, Development and Engineering Command (RDECOM) Director Dale Ormond signed a Cooperative Research and Development Agreement (CRADA).

The CRADA enables future collaboration between UMBC and the U.S. Army. At the signing, President Hrabowski spoke of the tremendous potential impact of the agreement, stating, “Nothing is more important in our country than building strong partnerships.” Director Ormond expressed enthusiasm for the partnership and discussed internships for UMBC students, saying, “Once I get a kid into our laboratories, they get to do things they can’t do anywhere else… We will challenge them beyond their wildest dreams.”

Immediately after the CRADA was signed, Karl Steiner, vice president of research at UMBC, and Suzanne Milchling, director of program integration at ECBC, signed a Joint Work Statement giving Professor Bradley Arnold, chemistry and biochemistry, and a graduate student the opportunity to conduct research at RDECOM’s Edgewood Chemical Biological Center (ECBC).

“Over the next 10 to 15 years, we’re going to have a huge changeover in our workforce. About 50 percent of our scientists and engineers are in their early to mid-50s,” Ormond shared. “I need smart, bright people who have STEM degrees to come work for us so we can continue to push the leading edges of science and engineering.”

Click here to view more of our grads!

As the first day of summer approaches, we’d like to look back and congratulate the class of 2014 for completing their undergraduate years at UMBC. This class created memories, opportunities, and relationships that are unlike any others, and were able to take part in many events while completing their degrees here. Thanks to the investment of donors like you, our grads are holding their heads high as they look to a future full of bigger and better things.

While it may not be immediately recognizable, your donations, no matter how big or small, all contribute to the livelihood and well-being of our campus, our faculty, and our students. We are grateful for every gift and show of support that you are able to offer.

Thank you for the past year of giving, and take a look at this video from one of our newest grads about the class of 2014!

Antonio “Tony” Moreira, vice provost of academic affairs and professor of chemical and biochemical engineering, has been awarded the National Order of Civil Merit of Public Education by the President of Portugal on behalf of the Portuguese government.

The award is given to distinguished individuals from the Portuguese diaspora community and is in celebration of the National Day of Portugal on June 10. The decoration will be presented to Moreira at the Portuguese Embassy in Washington, D.C. in the fall.

Click here to see the full list of awardees.

Upal Ghosh, professor in chemical and biochemical engineering, has partnered with Newcastle University in the project:

Development of Sustainable Technologies to Investigate, Restore and Protect the Urban Water Environment. Newcastle University, University of Maryland Baltimore County (US), Federal University of Minas Gerais (Brazil), Indian Institute of Technology Delhi (India) and CSIR-National Environmental Engineering Research Institute Nagpur (India)

The grant instituted through Newcastle University will support student and faculty research exchanges among the partnering institutions.

The project will examine urban water quality and was summarized by the researchers:

Urban water quality is under enormous pressure around the world because of increasing population density and economic activity in cities. Pollution disturbs the ecosystem functioning of urban streams, rivers, ponds and lakes; poses a risk to public health; decreases the value of surface waters for public recreation; and makes water more costly to treat for use. While faecal and industrial chemical pollution remain substantial challenges, new threats to urban water quality are emerging in highly populated areas from chemicals in widely used consumer and household products such as pharmaceuticals, personal care products, and biocides. At the same time, existing water pollution control infrastructure is costly and very energy-intensive (i.e. consumes 1.4% of national electricity in the UK) and should be replaced with more energy-efficient or net energy producing alternatives. In their infrastructure expansion, emerging economies like India and Brazil are presented with golden opportunities to leapfrog beyond the traditional wastewater treatment models and install more sustainable technologies that also address emerging challenges. The proposed global partnership between environmental engineers from Newcastle University (NCL), UK, the University of Maryland, Baltimore County (UMBC), USA, the Universidade Federal de Minas Gerais (UFMG), Brazil, the CSIR-National Environmental Engineering Research Institute (CSIR-NEERI) in Nagpur, India, and the Indian Institute of Technology Delhi (IITD), India, will pool knowledge, skills, technology testing and analytical facilities, and access to field sites and the facilities of industrial partners for the development of innovative methods to detect and monitor existing and emerging threats to the urban water environment, and sustainable technologies to reduce identified pollution releases and to remediate existing pollution deposits. This initiative will seek to recover urban water resources and their recreational and health values for the people living in cities, thus creating more desirable urban neighborhoods and providing new business opportunities.

Click here to view more of our grads!

As the first day of summer approaches, we’d like to look back and congratulate the class of 2014 for completing their undergraduate years at UMBC. This class created memories, opportunities, and relationships that are unlike any others, and were able to take part in many events while completing their degrees here. Thanks to the investment of donors like you, our grads are holding their heads high as they look to a future full of bigger and better things.

While it may not be immediately recognizable, your donations, no matter how big or small, all contribute to the livelihood and well-being of our campus, our faculty, and our students. We are grateful for every gift and show of support that you are able to offer.

Thank you for the past year of giving, and take a look at this video from one of our newest grads about the class of 2014!