Security research to thwart hackers

With cyber attackers upping the ante and security breaches becoming increasingly more sophisticated, RMIT and industry partner CA Technologies will work together to uncover new ways to mitigate potential breaches.

The project funding includes a $280,000 linkage grant from the Australian Research Council, with the three-year CA Labs project concentrating on aligning risk adaptation and continuous authentication.

The research will dynamically identify the assets within an organisation that need to be most protected, as well as identify high risk user behaviour patterns to deliver better forms of authentication and user management.

For example, if a user is acting outside their normal behaviour and access patterns, a security alert will be raised and a higher level of authentication (such as a password and fingerprint) may be required.

Associate Professor Serdar Boztas will lead the project, along with Associate Professor Asha Rao, Professors Kathy Horadam and Lewi Stone, a PhD student and a research fellow.

The RMIT researchers are core members of the Information Security and Network Science Research Group based at the School of Mathematical and Geospatial Sciences, working on problems ranging from pseudorandom sequence design to big data, biometrics and cryptography.

“We have enjoyed a productive partnership with CA Technologies and CA Labs since 2006 and in that time, we have undertaken two very successful security research projects,” Boztas said.

Steve Versteeg, Vice-President of Research at CA Labs, said the project would focus on enhancing the CA Risk Authentication product using different types of risk assessment and continuous authentication.

“Security measures must become more sophisticated to keep pace with the attackers, who are becoming increasingly more adept,” Versteeg said.

“Prototypes, algorithms and research papers that are developed as a result of the project will be shared with the company’s global research and development teams.”

For RMIT, the research will be published in international journals and papers.

“We’re excited to take this next initiative forward and add to CA’s research and development efforts as well as strengthen and diversify our own security research areas,” Boztas said.