VEP: a virtual machine for extended proof-carrying code

  • Authors:
  • Heidar Pirzadeh;Danny Dubé

  • Affiliations:
  • University of Montreal, Montreal, PQ, Canada;Université Laval, Quebec City, PQ, Canada

  • Venue:
  • Proceedings of the 1st ACM workshop on Virtual machine security
  • Year:
  • 2008

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Abstract

One of the key issues with the practical applicability of Proof-Carrying Code (PCC) and its related methods is the difficulty in communicating the proofs which are inherently large. One way to alleviate this problem is to transmit, instead, a proof generator for the program in question in a generic extended PCC framework (EPCC). The EPCC needs to provide the execution of the proof generator at the consumer side in a secure manner. The ability to securely run arbitrary untrusted proof generator is a challenging problem. We explore the design of a small and safe virtual machine (VEP) which provides the EPCC with a robust security guarantee. The VEP is a minor TCB extension of less than 300 lines of code which works as a safe execution environment and brings about a practical solution to thecommon security and resource management issues.