Software Networks

7Security

Security is of prime importance for the networks of today, and will become even more crucial in tomorrow’s world. With the Internet, it is necessary to constantly be inventing new procedures to ensure the non-disclosure of numerous elements, such as the location, the names of the parties being authenticated, the semantics of the messages, private information, etc. Of the various possible solutions, we shall discuss two in detail: the use of secure elements and the Cloud of security. Whilst the first solution has been in use for a long time, the second is a new paradigm which is becoming increasingly widespread.

Security in the world of networking is a paradigm which does not have a simple solution, besides making improvements to the existing algorithms, of which there are already a very great number, with a view to dealing with new attacks. Yet this chapter discusses a new solution in the world of security: the Cloud of security – i.e. a Cloud whose purpose is to secure the data and networks in the world of operators, companies and the general public. An initial diagram of a Cloud of security is shown in Figure 7.1. The Cloud of security contains numerous virtual machines for security such as authentication servers, authorization servers, identity management servers but also firewalls and even very specific firewalls corresponding to a particular application. We also sometimes find secure element servers which may contain thousands of SIM cards or HSMs (Hardware Security ...