{"id":220,"date":"2018-10-19T20:45:57","date_gmt":"2018-10-19T20:45:57","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/research.unl.edu\/annualreport\/2018\/?p=220"},"modified":"2018-10-23T14:17:27","modified_gmt":"2018-10-23T14:17:27","slug":"tightening-cloud-computing-security","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/research.unl.edu\/annualreport\/2018\/tightening-cloud-computing-security\/","title":{"rendered":"Tightening Cloud Computing Security"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p>Imagine sharing a backyard with your neighbor. Security concerns would abound, from unwanted visitors to missing tools and unruly pets. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Sheng Wei, assistant professor of computer science and engineering, said the perils of a shared backyard illustrate potential security challenges of a high-speed computing platform: the CPU-FPGA hybrid, an architecture that boosts cloud computing\u2019s speed. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>He\u2019s tightening security with a $496,940 Faculty Early Career Development Program award, the National Science Foundation\u2019s prestigious award for outstanding pre-tenure faculty. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"1600\" height=\"1067\" src=\"http:\/\/research.unl.edu\/annualreport\/2018\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/10\/180406_Sheng_Wei_051-SM.jpg\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-321\" srcset=\"https:\/\/research.unl.edu\/annualreport\/2018\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/10\/180406_Sheng_Wei_051-SM.jpg 1600w, https:\/\/research.unl.edu\/annualreport\/2018\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/10\/180406_Sheng_Wei_051-SM-300x200.jpg 300w, https:\/\/research.unl.edu\/annualreport\/2018\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/10\/180406_Sheng_Wei_051-SM-768x512.jpg 768w, https:\/\/research.unl.edu\/annualreport\/2018\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/10\/180406_Sheng_Wei_051-SM-1024x683.jpg 1024w, https:\/\/research.unl.edu\/annualreport\/2018\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/10\/180406_Sheng_Wei_051-SM-1200x800.jpg 1200w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 709px) 85vw, (max-width: 909px) 67vw, (max-width: 1362px) 62vw, 840px\" \/><figcaption>Sheng Wei<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p>In CPU-FPGA systems, the computer\u2019s brain \u2013 its CPU \u2013 is placed alongside a field-programmable gate array \u2013 the FPGA \u2013 a customizable hardware chip. Together, these \u201cneighbors\u201d accelerate performance, with the CPU outsourcing tasks to the FPGA. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>But this communication creates a vulnerable \u201cshared yard\u201d that attackers can exploit, wreaking havoc on cloud computing applications such as medical image processing and scientific computing. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>To stymie attacks, Wei is building a hardware \u201cfence\u201d that physically separates CPU-FPGA components into secure and nonsecure domains. A secure agent embedded in the secure domain thwarts malicious communications between the domains. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>He\u2019s also developing a programming tool that automatically slices secure versus nonsecure information, easing the burden for developers. It\u2019s the first of its kind for a CPU-FPGA system. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>To test his technologies, Wei partners with Adobe Research, Visa Research and Nebraska\u2019s Holland Computing Center.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-embed-youtube wp-block-embed is-type-video is-provider-youtube wp-has-aspect-ratio wp-embed-aspect-16-9\"><div class=\"wp-block-embed__wrapper\">\n<iframe loading=\"lazy\" width=\"840\" height=\"473\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/miJxXy2xtJs?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"autoplay; encrypted-media\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe>\n<\/div><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Imagine sharing a backyard with your neighbor. Security concerns would abound, from unwanted visitors to missing tools and unruly pets. Sheng Wei, assistant professor of computer science and engineering, said the perils of a shared backyard illustrate potential security challenges of a high-speed computing platform: the CPU-FPGA hybrid, an architecture that boosts cloud computing\u2019s speed. [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[5,154],"tags":[58,44,40,157,175,174,51,42,156],"class_list":["post-220","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-career","category-engineering","tag-career-award","tag-computer-science","tag-engineering","tag-high-speed-computing","tag-holland-computing-center","tag-industry-partners","tag-national-science-foundation","tag-security","tag-sheng-wei"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/research.unl.edu\/annualreport\/2018\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/220","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/research.unl.edu\/annualreport\/2018\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/research.unl.edu\/annualreport\/2018\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/research.unl.edu\/annualreport\/2018\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/research.unl.edu\/annualreport\/2018\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=220"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/research.unl.edu\/annualreport\/2018\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/220\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":322,"href":"https:\/\/research.unl.edu\/annualreport\/2018\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/220\/revisions\/322"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/research.unl.edu\/annualreport\/2018\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=220"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/research.unl.edu\/annualreport\/2018\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=220"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/research.unl.edu\/annualreport\/2018\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=220"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}