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Safeguarded, Hypervisor-based Installation of Highly Trusted Security Updates (SHIH-TSU)

Award Information
Agency: Department of Defense
Branch: Air Force
Contract: FA8750-14-C-0183
Agency Tracking Number: F141-044-0886
Amount: $149,986.00
Phase: Phase I
Program: SBIR
Solicitation Topic Code: AF141-044
Solicitation Number: 2014.1
Timeline
Solicitation Year: 2014
Award Year: 2014
Award Start Date (Proposal Award Date): 2014-06-24
Award End Date (Contract End Date): 2015-03-24
Small Business Information
153 Brooks Road
Rome, NY 13441-
United States
DUNS: 085851181
HUBZone Owned: No
Woman Owned: No
Socially and Economically Disadvantaged: No
Principal Investigator
 Michael Sieffert
 Principal Investigator
 (315) 336-3306
 sieffertm@ainfosec.com
Business Contact
 Nicole Capodiferro
Title: Contracts Manager
Phone: (315) 336-3306
Email: capodiferron@ainfosec.com
Research Institution
 Stub
Abstract

ABSTRACT: This effort will establish the capability to apply security patches to virtual machines (VMs) running operating systems that are misconfigured or malfunctioning. Application of the patches will be minimally dependent on the VM host, protected from interference by other processes, and require no connection to the internet. Patching VMs from the perspective of a hypervisor is difficult due to a number of reasons such as the semantic gap between the guest and the hypervisor, the ability of malware to interfere with the installation and processing of updates, and the undocumented nature of OS-specific mechanisms for the processing of updates. As such, there are currently no tools designed to initiate the application of security patches from the hypervisor itself. The approach taken by AIS will be to leverage the proprietary introspective hypervisor known as IntroVirt, along with its"wintrovirt"library built specifically to bridge the semantic gap between the hypervisor and running guests. This approach will succeed in part because a number of the anticipated challenges have already been investigated and shown to be both possible and effective using IntroVirt. BENEFIT: The capability to automatically apply security patches from a hypervisor is greatly needed in the burgeoning world of cloud computing where current methods of keeping a large system base up-to-date and free from the effects of malware are struggling to keep pace with growth of the industry. AIS will work with an advocate in cloud industry to ensure that the developed approach is compatible with current and future cloud implementations and encompassing infrastructure.

* Information listed above is at the time of submission. *

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