Robotics
Black Wall for Robots
Code: ANX-BW-002
Investigate a cyber-physical security architecture where a secure runtime — Black Wall — prevents compromised software from producing physically dangerous robot behavior, even when an attacker technically controls that software.
Why it matters
For a robot, software compromise is dangerous precisely because of the physical consequences it can command. In the Black Wall model a compromised process may execute — but a secure runtime sitting between the operating system and robotics middleware enforces hard physical-safety constraints. The system protects not only software integrity but the physical world the software can touch.
Research gap
Conventional security largely stops at software integrity and data confidentiality. Cyber-Physical Containment — enforcing bounds on the physical effects of software, so that no compromise can translate into unsafe motion or command — sits at a frontier where OS security, robotics middleware, and safety engineering must be co-designed.
Research questions
- 01 What are the minimal physical-safety invariants a secure runtime must enforce at the middleware boundary?
- 02 How can a secure runtime preserve real-time robotics guarantees while enforcing safety policies?
- 03 How can we reason formally that a compromised application cannot command an unsafe physical action?
- 04 What is the enforcement overhead on typical robotics middleware under real workloads?
Suggested technologies
Required skills
Team and supervisor
3-5 researchers, supervised by Muhammad Qasim.
Suitable for: OS, Robotics, Cybersecurity, Embedded, Systems.
Expected deliverables
- Black Wall secure-runtime architecture for robotics middleware
- Safety invariant library and enforcement prototype
- Research paper on Cyber-Physical Containment
Work on this problem
Apply to the lab and this problem becomes your supervised research project.