Endpoint Firewall Security Engine with Tamper-Resistant Partition
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Solution Overview
Problem
Current network security systems are vulnerable to malicious software that can compromise host operating systems, allowing unauthorized access and data exfiltration, as they cannot effectively verify the integrity of traffic flows and distinguish between legitimate and malicious applications.
Innovation Solution
Implementing a tamper-resistant environment that uses a security engine to apply security tokens and metadata to traffic flows, ensuring only approved applications from known entities can communicate, by monitoring memory conditions and initiating virtual environments for integrity checks, thereby preventing unauthorized access.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Reliability
If a traditional network security system is used, then network traffic can be monitored, but the system is vulnerable to malicious software that can compromise the host operating system and cannot verify the integrity of traffic flows
Solution Approach 1:
The system segments the security verification function into a separate tamper-resistant environment (secure partition) that is isolated from the host operating system. The security engine in this partition independently verifies traffic flow integrity using security tokens, preventing malware on the host from compromising the verification process. This segmentation resolves the contradiction by creating a trusted zone that can reliably verify integrity without being vulnerable to host-based malware.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent introduces security tokens as an intermediary mechanism between applications and the network. These tokens are applied by the security engine to traffic flows and serve as verification credentials that prove the legitimacy of the traffic source. The tokens enable reliable integrity verification without requiring the host operating system to trust applications directly, thus protecting against malware while maintaining verification reliability.
2Reliability
If comprehensive security checks are performed on all traffic flows, then unauthorized access can be prevented, but system performance and overhead increase
Solution Approach 1:
The security engine performs preliminary actions by applying security tokens to traffic flows at the source (in the secure partition) before the traffic leaves the endpoint device. This preliminary tagging of legitimate traffic with verification credentials allows downstream security systems to quickly validate traffic identity without performing comprehensive deep packet inspection, thus maintaining high security assurance while minimizing performance overhead.
Solution Approach 2:
The system implements selective security verification rather than checking every packet in detail. The security tokens provide sufficient verification information for most traffic flows, allowing the system to perform partial checks (token validation) instead of excessive comprehensive analysis. This approach maintains strong security assurance for legitimate traffic while reducing the processing overhead that would result from examining every byte of every packet.
Data Source
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AI summary
A method is provided in one example embodiment and includes receiving a traffic flow at a tamper resistant environment from an application, where the tamper resistant environment is separated from a host operating system. The method also includes applying a security token to the traffic flow and sending the traffic flow to a server. In specific embodiments, a security module may add information about the application to traffic flow. A trapping module may monitor for a memory condition and identify the memory condition. The trapping module may also, responsive to identifying the memory condition, initiate a virtual environment for the application, and check the integrity of the traffic flow.