"Protecting Our Physical and Digital Safety in Hospitals and Connected Cars"

Guillaume Dupont, a Ph.D. student at the Eindhoven University of Technology (TU/e), investigated the 'safeness' risks in hospitals and modern automobiles, two critical cyber-physical domains. He developed three key requirements to provide efficient security monitoring of these areas. Digitalization continues to transform the economy and technology landscape, resulting in an unprecedented reliance on networked systems such as computers, smartphones, and Internet of Things (IoT) devices. Some of these environments can conduct physical activities, and in order to do so, they gather, process, and store vast amounts of personal data from users. Although these technologies and operations provide several benefits, they also pose new threats that might have a significant impact on the 'safeness' of users (i.e., their physical safety and digital privacy). Attacks on cyber-physical systems can impact machine behavior, leading to physical harm to users. Furthermore, cybercriminals who steal and abuse personal data can affect individuals by using their data to commit fraud or extortion. Dupont's work has made a number of contributions, including a device classification method that aids in identifying network devices, the discovery of vulnerabilities in hospital communication protocols, a classification of intrusion detection systems for automotive networks, and a framework for the evaluation of these systems. These results enabled the identification of three main requirements for applying network security monitoring in safeness-critical environments. First, technical information on the network-connected devices is required, such as their type and function. Second, there must be information about device communication, including transmission patterns and data types exchanged. Third, one must be able to examine and assess the performance of network security monitoring tools such as intrusion detection systems. This article continues to discuss Dupont's study on network security monitoring in environments where digital and physical safety is critical. 

TU/e reports "Protecting Our Physical and Digital Safety in Hospitals and Connected Cars"