Physical Sciences and Mathematics Commons^™

Virtualization-Based System Hardening Against Untrusted Kernels, Yueqiang Cheng

Dissertations and Theses Collection (Open Access)

Applications are integral to our daily lives to help us processing sensitive I/O data, such as individual passwords and camera streams, and private application data, such as financial information and medical reports. However, applications and sensitive data all surfer from the attacks from kernel rootkits in the traditional architecture, where the commodity OS that is supposed to be the secure foothold of the system is routinely compromised due to the large code base and the broad attack surface. Fortunately, the virtualization technology has significantly reshaped the landscape of the modern computer system, and provides a variety of new opportunities for …