Category Archives: Project news

New THaW patents

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The THaW team is pleased to announce two new patents derived from THaW research, bringing the project total to five patents and one pending.  For the complete list, visit our Tech Transfer page.  The two new patents are described below.

  • March 2020: Xiaohui Liang, Tianlong Yun, Ron Peterson, and David Kotz. Secure System For Coupling Wearable Devices To Computerized Devices with Displays, March 2020. USPTO; U.S. Patent 10,581,606; USPTO. Download from https://patents.google.com/patent/US20170279612A1/en — Priority date 2014-08-18, Grant date 2020-03-03. Patent describes a system enabling information from mobile health sensors (eg Fitbit) to be displayed onto nearby screens without being affected by local security threats. The scheme uses visible light sensor on the mobile device. See papers liang:lighttouch and liang:jlighttouch.
  • February 2020: Timothy J. Pierson, Xiaohui Liang, Ronald Peterson, and David Kotz. Apparatus for Securely Configuring A Target Device and Associated Methods, February 2020. U.S. Patent 10,574,298; USPTO. Download from https://patents.google.com/patent/US20180191403A1/en — This is a patent. Priority date 2015-06-23, Grant date 2020-02-25. Patent based on “Wanda” device, described in other publications. Device implements a scheme for single antenna wi-fi device to determine its proximity to another wi-fi device with which it is communicating, in order to assure it is not unwittingly communicating with a distant adversary device rather than a nearby device. See paper pierson:wanda.

Do Breach Remediation Efforts Affect Patient Outcomes?

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THaW professor Eric Johnson was recently interviewed on the DataBreach Today podcast.  “How do hospitals’ efforts to bolster information security in the aftermath of data breaches potentially affect patient outcomes? Professor Eric Johnson of Vanderbilt University discusses recent research that shows a worrisome relationship between breach remediation and the delivery of timely patient care.”

You can find the 14-minute podcast, and written summary, on DataBreachToday.com.

The podcast discusses a recent THaW paper:

Sung J. Choi, M. Eric Johnson, and Christoph U. Lehmann. Data breach remediation efforts and their implications for hospital quality. Health Services Research 54(5), pages 971–980, September 2019. John Wiley & Sons. DOI: 10.1111/1475-6773.13203

Proximity detection with single-antenna IoT devices

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ACM SIGMOBILE has posted a video of our presentation of the THaW paper Proximity detection with single-antenna IoT devices at MobiCom’19.  Abstract below the video.

Timothy J. Pierson, Travis Peters, Ronald Peterson, and David Kotz. Proximity Detection with Single-Antenna IoT Devices. In Proceedings of the ACM International Conference on Mobile Computing and Networking (MobiCom), Article #21, October 2019. ACM Press. DOI 10.1145/3300061.3300120.

Abstract: Providing secure communications between wireless devices that encounter each other on an ad-hoc basis is a challenge that has not yet been fully addressed. In these cases, close physical proximity among devices that have never shared a secret key is sometimes used as a basis of trust; devices in close proximity are deemed trustworthy while more distant devices are viewed as potential adversaries. Because radio waves are invisible, however, a user may believe a wireless device is communicating with a nearby device when in fact the user’s device is communicating with a distant adversary. Researchers have previously proposed methods for multi-antenna devices to ascertain physical proximity with other devices, but devices with a single antenna, such as those commonly used in the Internet of Things, cannot take advantage of these techniques.

We present theoretical and practical evaluation of a method called SNAP – SiNgle Antenna Proximity – that allows a single-antenna Wi-Fi device to quickly determine proximity with another Wi-Fi device. Our proximity detection technique leverages the repeating nature Wi-Fi’s preamble and the behavior of a signal in a transmitting antenna’s near-field region to detect proximity with high probability; SNAP never falsely declares proximity at ranges longer than 14 cm.

THaW’s Klara Nahrstedt named AAAS Fellow

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THaW is proud to share news that Prof. Klara Nahrstedt, co-PI of the THaW project, has been recognized by the American Academy for the Advancement of Science as a Fellow of the AAAS.  To be named an AAAS Fellow is one of the most prestigious recognitions in the science community.  Congratulations to Klara!

More about her recognition here.

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photo by L. Brian Stauffer

Welcome Tim Pierson

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PiersonThe THaW team is pleased to welcome Dr. Timothy Pierson as an affiliated faculty member.  Tim is no stranger to THaW – he completed his PhD within the THaW project, publishing his work about systems named Wanda, SNAP, and CloseTalker.

Tim now serves as a Lecturer at Dartmouth College after completing a PhD in Computer Science in 2018. He previously spent more than 20 years working in strategy, technology, finance, and operations. He has led teams in a wide variety of organizations including: technology start-ups, hedge funds, management consulting, non-profits, and the military.

Tim’s PhD research focused on the privacy, security, and usability of wireless sensor networks. His work on a project called Wanda was featured in over 200 newspaper, radio and television stations, including the New York Times and the Washington Post.

Most recently before returning to school, Tim worked with a technology start-up where he developed and deployed 11,000 Internet of Things sensors in San Francisco to help the city manage traffic congestion and parking. Tim served on the firm’s Management Committee and was Chief Technology Officer.

Before the start-up, Tim was the Chief Technology Officer at Elliott Associates, one of the oldest and largest hedge funds in the world. There he led teams in New York, London, Hong Kong and Tokyo.

Prior to joining Elliott, Tim was a consultant at McKinsey & Company where he advised senior executives and helped craft the long-term strategic vision for companies in financial services, supply chain, energy, aviation, telecom, and retailing.

Before McKinsey & Company, Tim was Assistant Security Manager at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York where he managed projects and helped lead the Museum’s force of nearly 500 security guards that protect the multi-billion dollar art collection and ensure public safety.

Tim began his career in the US Air Force Special Operation Command where he conducted unconventional warfare operations around the world.

Tim holds a PhD in Computer Science as well as an MBA from Dartmouth College, and a BS in Computer Science from Michigan Tech.

Temperature sensors may be vulnerable in safety-critical systems

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Recent THaW research has demonstrated that temperature control systems, particularly in sensitive devices like infant incubators or industrial thermal chambers, can be affected by (and thus manipulated by) electromagnetic waves. The team included Prof. Kevin Fu and Research Investigator Sara Rampazzi from THaW, and Prof. Xiali Hei and PhD student Yazhou Tu from the University of Louisiana at Lafayette.

The vulnerability is due to the weakness of analog sensing components. In particular, the change in the measured temperature is due to an unintended rectification effect in amplifiers induced by injecting specific electromagnetic interferences though their temperature sensors.

The researchers demonstrate how it is possible remotely manipulate the temperature sensor measurements of critical devices, such as infant incubators, thermal chambers, and 3D printers. “In infant incubators for example, changing temperature sensor measurement can raise the risk of temperature-related health issues in infants, such as hyperthermia and hypothermia, which in turn can lead in extreme cases to hypoxia, and neurological complications.” Rampazzi says.

In a recent paper describing the attack method, the authors also describe a defense against the vulnerability, proposing a prototype of an analog anomaly detector to identify unintended interferences in the affected frequency range.

The paper was presented this month at the ACM Conference on Computer and Communications Security (CCS), and is available at DOI 10.1145/3319535.3354195.

Short video demos of the effect on an infant incubator are available on YouTube.

 

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Wanda – Securely introducing mobile devices

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A few years ago we posted a fun video describing our Wanda approach to securely introduce mobile devices to a Wi-Fi network… or to each other.  Wanda was published in INFOCOM 2016; since then we’ve refined the technique with the CloseTalker (MobiSys 2019) and SNAP (MobiCom 2019).  We just made a new Wanda video, which we hope you’ll enjoy!

With a Laser, Researchers Say They Can Hack Alexa, Google Home or Siri

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The New York Times just posted a story about this startling new research from Kevin Fu and his group, funded in part by THaW.  The research team posted more details here.

 

IEEE recognizes THaW researcher for establishing field of medical device security

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Professor Kevin Fu’s 2008 paper called “Pacemakers and Implantable Cardiac Defibrillators: Software Radio Attacks and Zero-Power Defenses” has received the inaugural IEEE Security and Privacy “Test of Time” Award:  http://eecs.umich.edu/eecs/about/articles/2019/fu-test-of-time.html 

The paper was been recognized from a pool of submissions spanning 40 years with the inaugural IEEE Security and Privacy Test of Time Award, and its impact can be felt in every corner of the medical devices industry.

In the 11 years since the paper’s publication, Fu and others in his field have worked on solutions. Many of these have been technical, but most of the larger impact the paper has had has been in leadership.

“A lot of it is about community building and standards development,” Fu says, “which is sometimes a foreign concept in academia. But it’s really important to industry.”

Welcome Michel Reece

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Michel.ReeceThe THaW team is pleased to welcome Prof. Michel Reece, of Morgan State University, as a new collaborator in research on security and privacy issues medical devices.  Together with Tim Pierson (Dartmouth) and David Kotz (Dartmouth), Michel and her group will investigate the potential for identifying devices through features sensed at the PHY and MAC layers, and validating the authenticity of such devices.

Dr. Michel A. Reece currently serves as the interim Chairperson and  the director of  the laboratory for Advanced RF/Microwave Measurement and Electronic Design (ARMMED) in the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering at Morgan State University (MSU). Her research interests include wireless  signal characterization and device authentication of IoT devices, high frequency device characterization and modeling for III-V semiconductors, RF/ MMIC circuit design, adaptable electronic components for software defined radio applications and most recently power amplifier development for THz mobile communication applications. She received her B.S from Morgan State in 1995 and her M.S.E.E.  from Penn State in 1997, both in Electrical Engineering. She became the first female recipient at MSU  to obtain her doctorate degree in Engineering in 2003.  Previously, she served as a post- doctoral researcher of the Microwave Systems Section of the RF Engineering Group at Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory Space Department. She has a passion for education where she has developed curriculum for the RF Microwave Engineering concentration offered at MSU, one out of a few HBCUs to have a dedicated program in this area. She has also taught as an adjunct faculty member at Johns Hopkins University Engineering Professionals Program.