ADASEC-TB: Cryptography Verification & Benchmarking for Next-Generation Networking Hardware

Abstract

: Next-generation networks aim to provide a wide range of services which require high level of performance and security. In some services, security is particularly important and lack of it can lead to critical consequences due to sensitivity of the information being transmitted. Therefore, research in the field of security has significantly increased and a number of security solutions for next-generation networks are already developed. For every security solution, there is a need for a trusted test environment which can be used for its functional verification and performance evaluation. Existing security testbeds do not provide reproducible testing and evaluation of hardware-based cryptography solutions, which are especially important for high-speed next-generation networks. To overcome this limitation, we present a modular, flexible testbed which comprises several tasks: traffic generation, traffic processing (i.e. performing desired network or security functions) and analysis of traffic obtained after its processing. Suitability of our testbed for hardware-based cryptography solutions is demonstrated on an example of selective encryption through RTL simulation using ModelSim simulator.