2nd Joint NIST/SBA Workshop on Combinatorial Security Testing

Welcome to the webpage of the second joint workshop between NIST and SBA Research on combinatorial security testing. The workshop was held at Vienna on August 4th, 2016.

Combinatorial testing is a powerful testing methodology originating from discrete mathematics which ensures automation, reduction of test suite sizes and revelation of software or hardware faults that depend on a few parameters of the system under test.

The ACTS/NIST team is one of the leading research groups world-wide on combinatorial testing and pioneers in deploying it to various application domains ranging from aerospace firms and organizations (e.g. Lockheed Martin, NASA) to medical devices and distributed servers.

The Combinatorial Security Testing team of SBA Research aims on extending combinatorial testing from classical software testing to all application layers of Information Security. So far, the team has gained significant experience and recognition by successfully applying combinatorial testing methodologies to complex web applications, operating system kernels, security protocols and to the detection of Hardware Trojan Horses performing cryptographic operations over FPGA technologies. Currently, the team is solicitating results on the foundations of combinatorial testing, e.g. algorithms and new structures.

Organizer

Dr. Dimitris E. Simos, SBA Research

Invited Speakers

Dr. Raghu Kacker, Applied and Computational Mathematics Division, National Institute of Standards & Technology

Prof. Jeff Lei, Department of Computer Science and Engineering, The University of Texas at Arlington

Scope and Outcome

The scope of the workshop was to strengthen the existing and already high successful cooperation between the Combinatorial Security Testing team of SBA Research and the ACTS project team of US NIST on the research field of combinatorial security testing.

Prior efforts that established a common vision for commbinatorial security testing can be found here.

The workshop was highly successful and paved the way for new applications of combinatorial security testing in cyber-physical systems, cryptography and web technologies, together with the advancement of methodologies for constructing optimal arrays and covering sequences. The related results be made available to the public soon.

Program of the Workshop and Slides of the Presentations:

Speaker Title
10:00 - 10:30 Opening Session
10:00 - 10:10 Mag. Markus Klemen
Managing Director
SBA Research
Welcome Notes
10:10 - 10:20 Dr. Raghu Kacker
PI of ACTS project
ITL/NIST
Project Status
10:20 - 10:30 Dr. Dimitris E. Simos
Key Researcher
SBA Research
Combinatorial Security Testing: Current Status, Recent Results and Next Steps [ slides ]
10:30 - 12:00 Session A: Algorithms for Combinatorial Testing
10:30 - 11:00 Bernhard Garn, BSc.
Junior Researcher
SBA Research
Algebraic Modelling of Covering Arrays
11:00 - 11:30 Ludwig Kampel, BSc.
Junior Researcher
SBA Research
IFS Algorithm: A Set Notation based Approach to CAs
11:30 - 12:00 Prof. Jeff Lei
PI of ACTS project
University of Texas at Arlington
Constraint Handling in Combinatorial Test Generation using Forbidden Tupples
12:00 - 13:00
Lunch
13:00 - 14:30 Session B: Applications of Combinatorial Testing to Security
13:00 - 13:30 Prof. Jeff Lei
PI of ACTS project
University of Texas at Arlington
Combinatorial Testing for Buffer Overflow Vulnerability Detection
13:30 - 14:00 Kristoffer Kleine, B.Sc.
Junior Researcher
SBA Research
Combinatorial Methods for X.509 Certificate Testing
14:00 - 14:30 Prof. Jeff Lei
PI of ACTS project
University of Texas at Arlington
Combinatorial Testing for Big Data: A Work-in-Progress Report
14:30 - 15:00
Coffee Break
15:00 - 16:00 Session C: Emerging Topics on Combinatorial Testing
15:00 - 15:15 Kristoffer Kleine, B.Sc.
Junior Researcher
SBA Research
t-way Sequence Testing in Information Security
15:15 - 15:30 Bernhard Garn, BSc.
Junior Researcher
SBA Research
Weighted-based t-way Sequence Testing and Applications
15:30 - 15:45 Ludwig Kampel, BSc.
Junior Researcher
SBA Research
Sequence Covering Arrays and Sequence Covering Sequences
15:45 - 16:00 Dr. Dimitris E. Simos
Key Researcher
SBA Research
Future of Combinatorial Testing: Foundations and Applications
16:00 - 17:00 Session D: CST Project Committee Meeting