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Computer Security, The Next 50 Years
bariswheel writes "Alan Cox, fellow at Red Hat Linux, gives a short-and-sweet talk at the European OSCON on the The Next 50 Years of Computer Security. Implementations of modularity, Trusted Computing hardware, 'separation of secrets,' and overcoming the challenge of users not reading dialog boxes, will be crucial milestones as we head on to the future. He states: "As security improves, we need to keep building things which are usable, which are turned on by default, which means understanding users is the target for the next 50 years. You don't buy a car with optional bumpers. You can have a steering wheel fitted if you like, but it comes with a spike by default." All of this has to be shipped in a way that doesn't stop the user from doing things."
you know he wrote the Red Hat FireStarter iptables GUI and various parts of the linux tcp/ip stack right?
Cybie! aka Ralph Bonnell
More importantly, the security models currently used in the kernel are broken, and we can formally prove that they are inadequate. Academic research in this area has been extremely productive, but there are major barriers to entry in the commercial world for the obvious reasons.
At the moment it looks like micrkernel architectures (real ones, none of this hybrid stuff) coupled with capability based security systems, should be able to provide real, formally verifiable security. As with most things there are a handful of practical barriers to overcome (primarily performance related), but another 5-10 years and those problems should be sorted out.
For a more in-depth discussion of capability systems, see the wiki page, and this essay by Dr. Jonathan Shapiro. (And to be perfectly honest, he's a professor of mine and my views are colored as such.)