A Formal Verification Centred Development Process for Security Protocols

Abstract

This chapter concerns the correct and reliable design of modern security protocols. It discusses the importance of formal verification of security protocols prior to their release by publication or implementation. A discussion on logic-based verification of security protocols and its automation provides the reader with an overview of the current state-of-the-art of formal verification of security protocols. The authors propose a formal verification centred development process for security protocols. This process provides strong confidence in the correctness and reliability of the designed protocols. Thus, the usage of weak security protocols in communication systems is prevented. A case-study on the development of a security protocol demonstrates the advantages of the proposed approach. The case-study concludes with remarks on the performance of automated logic-based verification and presents an overview of formal verification results of a range of modern security protocols.