6 - Protection Mechanisms and Secure Design Principles

Abstract

The traditional families of protection mechanisms used in cyberspace are largely applicable on cyber-physical systems but not always in the same manner or with the same effectiveness as on conventional computer systems. For example, whitelisting approaches tend to be more effective than blacklisting ones, protection of integrity and availability may have higher priority than protection of confidentiality, and intrusion detection may rely not only on cyberspace metrics but also on information collected by sensors in physical space. The aim of this chapter is to describe the protection mechanisms that have been deployed on cyber-physical systems, in real-world or laboratory environments, as well as the age-old secure design principles that have stood the test of time for conventional computer systems and are proving highly applicable in this context as well.