Firewall Will Protect Computer Systems From Cyber Threats

09:32, July 8, 2024

The project is implemented by the Ural Interregional Research and Education Center

 Scientists from the Ural Federal University are developing a firewall that will protect computers from cyber threats such as phishing, trojan horses, DDoS attacks, and others. This development is part of the Ural Interregional Research and Education Center's project portfolio.

"The firewall is designed to filter traffic at the entrance to complex computer systems that are used in industry, oil and gas sector, cellular or Internet communication equipment. Such a screen is a virtual processor with a known command system, which makes it possible to realize this technology as a hardware gas pedal under the control of a control device. This is a hardware solution, not a software one. With quality development and customization, such a device can protect the system from a wide variety of attacks," says Andrey Gusev, senior lecturer at the Department of Radio Electronics and Communications of IRIT-RtF UrFU.

The peculiarity of this screen is that it is produced on special chips of programmable logic and due to it there is a hardware realization of filters of data packets that come from the Internet.

"That is, such a device allows you to be on the fly, even before entering the computer system, to filter and reject what should not get inside. Here we are talking about rather high-speed gigabit communication channels. In addition to industrial automation, a big area for use is the Internet of Things. It would be expensive to put such a filter on every such thing. The alternative is to create similar relatively inexpensive hardware devices that are easier to set up and use," notes Andrey Gusev.

According to Andrey Gusev, the course of development of Unix systems has shown that the abstraction of a virtual processor that is simple enough, fast, and safe for the functioning of other programs is very much in demand today. The reliability of large enterprises that use automatic control of various production processes depends on it. And the slightest external intrusion can affect the production process most negatively.

The developer of the traffic filtering module is the Engineering School of Information Technologies, Telecommunications and Control Systems (IRIT-RTF UrFU) together with KIT Company, a member of UDV Group. The project is realized with the support of the company UCSB.

According to Pavel Bogdanov, head of development of the UDV Group's Department of Hardware and Software Development, the standard firewall procedure successfully blocks illegitimate traffic.

"It is possible to realize traffic passing and filtering at the speeds required by the business due to a separate hardware module. Currently, there is a tendency to decrease the rate of performance increase for new generations of processor systems, and the requirements for traffic processing speed only increase. In this regard, we see prospects in the creation of dedicated specialized additional hardware devices, allowing to remove decision-making load from the main processor module. Our customers are mainly industrial automation companies that use firewalls not only for perimeter control but also as segmentation devices to delimit internal data flows, the volume of which can significantly exceed the volume of cross-border connections. While the firewall is at the prototyping stage, procedures, development, and testing are actively underway. For now, we are testing the prototypes developed jointly with UrFU on internal stands," says Pavel Bogdanov.

Eduard Nikulnikov

• Ural Interregional Research and Education Center

The news article was translated by UrFU International Marketing Office.
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