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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."
This article seems to focus more on security by design, which is of course important. However security also can be implemented at the language level, for example Java's sandbox. I predict that over the next 50 years languages will improve to prevent programmer from making "stupid" mistakes such as copying user input directly into a buffer that will be become an html document. Tainting already solves some of these problems, but there is still work to be done. (for example to discourage programmers from creating empty "de-tainting" routines when they don't have time to do it properly, de-tainting should really be done by libraries and by the language alone, but I digress)
Philosophy.
....and overcoming the challenge of users not reading dialog boxes....
I have to agree that this is a serious concern and as a tech, I often want to blame the stupid user since I deal with them frequently but on the other hand, can you really blame them? In any given day, an end user sees an unmeasurable amount of dialog boxes and our minds are designed to filter out things that are annoying. Instead of "Hey your email wasnt sent" you get 3 dialog boxes first that have no meaning. Of course, there is the next-next-finish epidemic as well. Does anyone really ready any options anymore? We all just go for the next button until it turns into a finish button. There are 2 huge problems with this. The first is that mixed in with all these stupid notices, there are important messages that go unnoticed. The second issue is that this is something that spyware companies thrive on for legalities.... in the middle of those next-next-finish games is the little line that signs your computer over to the dark side.
Aviation went through this phase a long time ago. Accidents were called "pilot error" unless the airplane broke up in midair.
The field of "human factors" recognized that controls and displays need to be designed so that it's possible for a well trained human to get things right even in a hurry. Controls with opposite effects should not be right next to each other. Controls should give meaningful feedback. Important controls should be out in the open where someone can see them.
The aviation world fixed up the cockpit and many "pilot errors" disappeared.
You can't apply these lessons too directly to computer security because bad guys are actively trying to trick computer users. Nobody sends pilots email in flight saying "You must pull the red lever immediately to avoid running out of fuel!". But at least it should be easy enough to secure a computer that an employee from a security firm can do it. We're not there yet -- a recent security conference had vendors running open WiFi access points without firewalls.