International Business Machines Corporation

Lenovo (singapore) Pte. Ltd.

Lenvo (singapore) Pte. Ltd.

Leendert Peter Van Doorn

Steven A Bade

Andrew Gregory Kegel

David Carroll Challener

David R Safford

Steven James Mastrianni

Ronald Perez

Reiner Sailer

Ratan Ray

Linda Nancy Betz

Joseph Robert Parker

Kenneth Alan Goldman

Francis Edward Noel, Jr

Stefan Berger

Trent Ray Jaeger

Helmut H Weber

Garry Michael Kump

Douglas L Schales

A trusted platform module is presented that is capable of creating, dynamically, multiple virtual trusted platform modules in a hierarchical organization. A trusted platform module domain is created. The trusted platform module creates virtual trusted platform modules, as needed, in the trusted platform module domain. The virtual trusted platform modules can inherit the permissions of a parent trusted platform module to have the ability to create virtual trusted platform modules themselves. Each virtual trusted platform module is associated with a specific partition. Each partition is associated with an individual operating system. The hierarchy of created operating systems and their privilege of spawning new operating systems is reflected in the hierarchy of trusted platform modules and the privileges each of the trusted platform modules has.

Dynamic creation and hierarchical organization of trusted platform modules

The present invention provides a computer-implemented method system and program product for remotely verifying (e.g., analytic) integrity of a system. Specifically, at startup of the system an access control policy that sets forth information flows within the system is read and a set of trusted subjects that interact with a target application in the system is determined. Based on the access information flows and the set of trusted subjects, an information flow graph of the system is constructed. At runtime of the target application, runtime information and program code loaded into the set of trusted subjects are measured. Measuring the program code that is loaded allows the remote party to verify that the program code is 'expected' program code for the set of trusted subjects.

Method, system and program product for remotely verifying integrity of a system

A method, system and computer program product for enhancing the functionality of the existing core root of trust measurement (CRTM). The CRTM is extended to allow platform manufacturer controlled and certified code to be incorporated into the function of the CRTM, wherein the manufacturer may define the policy for accepting a new function into the CRTM. When a firmware or software module image is compiled, the build process generates a hash value of the compiled firmware or software image, wherein the hash value reflects a fingerprint (or short hand) representation of the compiled image. A determination is made as to whether the hash value of the firmware or software image is to be a CRTM extension. If so, a digital signature of the module is created using the CRTM extension private key. This signature value is added to the firmware or software module.

Method for extending the CRTM in a trusted platform

Multiple trusted platform modules within a data processing system are used in a redundant manner that provides a reliable mechanism for securely storing secret data at rest that is used to bootstrap a system trusted platform module. A hypervisor requests each trusted platform module to encrypt a copy of the secret data, thereby generating multiple versions of encrypted secret data values, which are then stored within a non-volatile memory within the trusted platform. At some later point in time, the encrypted secret data values are retrieved, decrypted by the trusted platform module that performed the previous encryption, and then compared to each other. If any of the decrypted values do not match a quorum of values from the comparison operation, then a corresponding trusted platform module for a non-matching decrypted value is designated as defective because it has not been able to correctly decrypt a value that it previously encrypted.

Method and system for bootstrapping a trusted server having redundant trusted platform modules

A method, system and computer program product for implementing general purpose PCRs with extended semantics (referred to herein as 'ePCRs') in a trusted, measured software module. The module is designed to run in one of a hypervisor context, an isolated partition, or under other isolated configurations. Because the software module is provided using trusted (measured) code, the software implementing the PCRs is able to run as a simple software process in the operating system (OS), as long as the software is first measured and logged. The software-implemented ePCRs are generated as needed to record specific measurements of the software and hardware elements on which an application depends, and the ePCRs are able to ignore other non-dependencies.

Sealing of data for applications

A solution for evaluating trust in a computer infrastructure is provided. In particular, a plurality of computing devices in the computer infrastructure evaluate one or more other computing devices in the computer infrastructure based on a set of device measurements for the other computing device(s) and a set of reference measurements. To this extent, each of the plurality of computing devices also provides a set of device measurements for processing by the other computing device(s) in the computer infrastructure.

Trust evaluation

A method, computer readable medium and computer system for repairing a failed network connection between a client system and a network is disclosed. In a first aspect, the method preferably includes collecting real time connectivity information by the client system and utilizing the real time connectivity information by the client system to establish a connection with the network. In a second aspect, a computer system coupled to a network includes at least one network adapter for monitoring and collecting real time connectivity information from the network, memory for storing the real time connectivity information, and a processor coupled to the memory and to the at least one network adapter, where the processor is configured to execute program instructions for utilizing the real time connectivity information to repair a failed network connection between the computer system and the network.

Method and system for establishing network connections

Methods, apparatus and program products which monitor wireless access points () through which data can be exchanged with a network (), identify an unauthorized access point (), and respond to monitored data flow in a variety of manners including determining the location of the identified unauthorized access point, establishing filtering, and controlling accounting for access services.

Methods apparatus and program products for wireless access points

A method for repairing a failed network connection between a client system and a network is disclosed. In a first aspect, the method preferably includes collecting real time connectivity information by the client system and utilizing the real time connectivity information by the client system to establish a connection with the network.

Method for establishing network connections

A computer system, method of operation, and program product which gives a clear indication to a user when a computer system has transitioned to a trusted state.

Computer system apparatus and method for improved assurance of authentication

The Virtual Machine is viewed by many as inherently insecure despite all the efforts to improve its security. This invention provides methods, apparatus, and computer products to implement a system that provides operating system style protection for code. Although applicable to many language systems, the invention is described for a system employing the Java language. Hardware protection domains are used to separate Java classes, provide access control on cross domain method invocations, efficient data sharing between protection domains, and memory and CPU resource control. Apart from the performance impact, these security measures are all transparent to the Java programs, even when a subclass is in one domain and its superclass is in another, when they do not violate the policy. To reduce the performance impact, classes are grouped and shared between protection domains and map data lazily as it is being shared. The system has been implemented on top of the Paramecium operating system used as an example of an extensible operating system application.

Growing community of inventors

Valhalla, NY, United States of America

Leendert Peter Van Doorn