Drs. Lan and Venkataramani Have Received a 4-Year, $1.47M Grant From the Office of Naval Research

Drs. Tian Lan and Guru Venkataramani have received a 4-year, $1.47M grant from the Office of Naval Research, titled “DIALECT: Communication Protocols Customization via Feature DIAgnosis, Lacing, Elimination, Cross-grafting, and Trimming”.  The project will investigate how to individualize security in cyber systems by customizing their protocols. In contrast to the currently adopted “protocol standards", this first-of-a-kind approach is motivated by the fact that unnecessary code/layer often introduced by standards may eventually be used as backdoors for security exploits, while protocol customization enables the feature to debloat and can significantly eliminate the risks associated with monoculture cyber systems. The project will also explore "tech push" opportunities in collaboration with naval labs.