Determining the integrity of application binaries on unsecure legacy machines using software based remote attestation

Abstract

Integrity of computing platforms is paramount. A platform is as secure as the applications executing on it. All applications are created with some inherent vulnerability or loophole. Attackers can analyze the presence of flaws in a particular binary and exploit them. Traditional virus scanners are also binaries which can be attacked by malware. This paper implements a method known as Remote Attestation entirely in software to attest the integrity of a process using a trusted external server. The trusted external server issues a challenge to the client machine which responds to the challenge. The response determines the integrity of the application. © 2010 Springer-Verlag.