The reliable protection ofcritical infrastructures iscritical to a country‘s positionin global competition.
SECURITY
FOR OUR
DIGITAL SOCIETY
In the future, the security of ICT systems will no longer be guaranteed withconventional methods and procedures. For this reason, the AIT is researchingnew concepts and technologies for authorities, IT and financial companies inorder to efficiently integrate safety mechanisms into future ICT systems.
In our modern, globally interconnected and digitizedsociety, the rules for mastering digital technologyhave fundamentally changed for the benefit of posi-tive social and economic development.
On the one hand, due to comprehensive interconnec-tion in all our spheres of life, we are building complexsystems which no longer simply behave in a deter-ministic manner. System of Systems, Internet ofThings (IoT), and Cyber Physical Systems (CPS) de-note the increasing complexity of our technical plat-forms which makes it increasingly difficult to fully un-derstand the systems in detail and to agree on rigidrules for the description of correct system behaviour.
Against this background, state-of-the-art informationand communication technologies (ICT) and systems arebeing developed in the AIT Center for Digital Safety andSecurity in order to design critical infrastructures in asecure and reliable manner in the context of compre-hensive and global networking and digitization.
OUR APPROACH
Digitization floods all areas of life and determines industry, commerceand finance. On the one hand, this leads to improved development op-portunities, but on the other hand security risks also increase. As partof the research focus Cyber Attack Information System, internationalexperts are researching new techniques for anomaly detection of ITsystems for a better defence against cyber attacks and for the efficientanalysis of current threat scenarios for computer systems. AIT is an in-ternationally renowned coordinator of research projects in this field anda reliable partner of public authorities, business and industry as well asscience. Other AIT topics closely intertwined with this research focusinclude the development of state-of-the-art encryption methods for vir-tual IT systems, or Data Science for the research and development ofnew approaches to modern data management (big data, blockchaintechnologies).
HIGHLY SECURE ENCRYPTION TECHNOLOGIES
Many new challenges are emerging for the design of secure and intelli-gent communication systems of the next generation, with these in par-ticular also calling for new approaches in cryptography. For this reason,new cryptographic methods are being researched and examinations areconducted at the AIT to see how these can be used to make ICT sys-tems of the future safer. Methods, concepts and prototypes are devel-oped, which are not only intended to help better protect user data, butalso their privacy in the interaction with ICT in the context of cloud com-puting and the IoT.
Cloud computing is one of the most important IT trends in recent years.For this reason, major companies are investing heavily in cloud infra-structures. A representative example of the growth rate is Italy where20% of all IT companies already use cloud-based services and a further58% intend to introduce such services in the near future. However,since the cloud computing paradigm encompasses many aspects ofcurrent IT enterprise infrastructures such as security management inorganizations, facility management and the consideration of regulatoryframeworks, it gives rise to increasing concerns in terms of security,reliability and information protection. AIT develops state-of-the-art con-cepts, methods and technologies for the implementation of protected,reliable and highly secure cloud computing environments for critical ITinfrastructures.
ON THE TRAIL OF VIRTUAL MONEY
The Digital Insight Lab at the Center for Digital Safety & Security at AITconducts research in the area of virtual currencies and develops toolsand methods to make these measurable and thereby limit abuse. Inter-net currencies like Bitcoin act like digitized cash. Vendors and customerscan trade and make payments without the need for other organizationssuch as banks or credit card companies as intermediaries. The payerscan remain anonymous. All of this also makes Bitcoin interesting forcriminals or for trading in illegal goods or money laundering. In Austria,the AIT coordinated the German-Austrian research project Bitcrime,which was funded by the KIRAS security research program of the Austri-an Ministry for Transport, Innovation and Technology („bmvit“). At the Eu-ropean level, the AIT has also become a recognized center of excellencein the field of virtual currencies and is working together with various pub-lic institutions and authorities to examine the various technical, but alsosocial and legal aspects that virtual currencies entail.
Foto: AIT/Johannes Zinner
Ross King, Digital Insight Lab: „Virtualcurrencies such as Bitcoin represent entirelynew challenges for the Federal authorities.