Security Requirements Engineering Research Articles

Security Requirements Engineering: A Framework for Representation and Analysis

This paper presents a framework for security requirements elicitation and analysis. The framework is based on constructing a context for the system, representing security requirements as constraints, and developing satisfaction arguments for the security requirements. The system context is described using a problem-oriented notation, then is validated against the security requirements through construction of a satisfaction argument. The satisfaction argument consists of two parts: a formal argument that the system can meet its security requirements and a structured informal argument supporting the assumptions expressed in the formal argument. The construction of the satisfaction argument may fail, revealing either that the security requirement cannot be satisfied in the context or that the context does not contain sufficient information to develop the argument. In this case, designers and architects are asked to provide additional design information to resolve the problems. We evaluate the framework by applying it to a security requirements analysis within an air traffic control technology evaluation project.

Protecting privacy in system design: the electronic voting case

PurposeThe purpose of the paper is to present Privacy Safeguard (PriS) a formal security requirements engineering methodology which, incorporates privacy requirements in the system design process and to demonstrate its applicability in an e‐voting case.Design/methodology/approachPriS provides a methodological framework for addressing privacy‐related issues during system development. It provides a set of concepts for formally expressing privacy requirements (authentication, authorisation, identification, data protection, anonymity, pseudonymity, unlinkability and unobservability) and a systematic way‐of‐working for translating these requirements into system models. The main activities of the PriS way‐of‐working are: elicit privacy‐related goals, analyse the impact of privacy goals on processes, model affected processes using privacy process patterns and identify the technique(s) that best support/implement the above‐process patterns.FindingsAnalysis of a number of well known privacy‐enhancing technologies, as well as of existing security requirement engineering methodologies, pinpoints the gap between system design methodologies and technological solutions. To this end, PriS provides an integrated approach for matching privacy‐related requirements to proper implementation techniques. Experimentation with the e‐voting case suggests that PriS has a high degree of applicability on internet systems that wish to provide services that ensure users privacy, such as anonymous browsing, untraceable transactions, etc.Originality/valueThe paper proposes a new methodology for addressing privacy requirements during the design process. Instead of prescribing a single solution, PriS guides developers to choose the most appropriate implementation techniques for realizing the identified privacy issues. In addition, due to its formal definition it facilitates control of the accuracy and precision of the results and enables the development of automated tools for assisting its application.

Requirements engineering for trust management: model, methodology, and reasoning

A number of recent proposals aim to incorporate security engineering into mainstream software engineering. Yet, capturing trust and security requirements at an organizational level, as opposed to an IT system level, and mapping these into security and trust management policies is still an open problem. This paper proposes a set of concepts founded on the notions of ownership, permission, and trust and intended for requirements modeling. It also extends Tropos, an agent-oriented software engineering methodology, to support security requirements engineering. These concepts are formalized and are shown to support the automatic verification of security and trust requirements using Datalog. To make the discussion more concrete, we illustrate the proposal with a Health Care case study.

Incorporating privacy requirements into the system design process

PurposeTo present a new methodology for incorporating privacy requirements into the system design process called PriS, and describe its applicability in the e‐VOTE system for presenting methodology's way‐of‐working.Design/methodology/approachPriS is a requirement engineering methodology focused on privacy issues. It provides a set of concepts for modelling privacy requirements (anonymity, pseudonymity, unlinkability and unobservability) in the organisation domain and a systematic way‐of‐working for translating these requirements into system models. The conceptual model used in PriS is based on the Enterprise Knowledge Development (EKD) framework. PriS models privacy requirements as a special type of goal.FindingsBased on the analysis of a number of well‐known privacy‐enhancing technologies as well as of existing security requirement engineering methodologies, this paper pinpoints the gap between system design methodologies and technological solutions. To this end, PriS is suggested, with a view to providing a methodological framework for matching privacy‐related requirements with the proper implementation techniques.Originality/valueThis paper proposes a new methodology for addressing privacy requirements during the design process. It guides developers to choose the most appropriate implementation techniques for realising the identified privacy issues. PriS methodology has a high degree of applicability on Internet systems that wish to provide services that ensure users privacy, such as anonymous browsing, untraceable transactions, etc.

Holistic security requirement engineering for electronic commerce

With the introduction of electronic commerce, business is becoming dependent on information systems in a new way. Information security is thus becoming more and more important to companies' self-protection. In contrast to previous systems, this is also directly visible to the customer. The changing situation means, however, that the requirements for security cannot be solely filled by new policies and risk analysis. This article proposes an approach called “holistic security requirement engineering” meant to elicit security requirements according to system-theoretic considerations. It will show that security requirements can be defined with the help of investigations in the business environment, workshops with stakeholders and risk analysis. This multidimensional approach will lead to a holistic understanding of the requirements that fit into the system development life cycles.

An Approach to Security Requirements Engineering for a High Assurance System *

Requirements specifications for high-assurance secure systems are rare in the open literature. This paper examines the development of a requirements document for a multilevel secure system that must meet stringent assurance and evaluation requirements. The system is designed to be secure, yet combines popular commercial components with specialised high-assurance ones. Functional and non-functional requirements pertinent to security are discussed. A multidimensional threat model is presented. The threat model accounts for the developmental and operational phases of system evolution and for each phase accounts for both physical and non-physical threats. We describe our team-based method for developing a requirements document and relate that process to techniques in requirements engineering. The system requirements document presented provides a calibration point for future security requirements engineering techniques intended to meet both functional and assurance goals.