Site Map | College of Engineering | UC Davis | MyUCDavis

ECS 235 COMPUTER AND INFORMATION SECURITY (4) I

Lecture: 3 hours

Project: 1 hour

Prerequisite: Course ECS 150

Grading: Letter; homework (1/3), project (1/3), final (1/3)

Catalog Description:
Methods of protecting data in computer and communication systems from unauthorized disclosure and modification. Introduction to mathematical principles of security with applications to operating systems, database systems and computer networks. Not open for credit to students who have completed course 253.

Goals:
Basics of computer and information security: foundations, models of confidentiality, integrity, and hybrid models; basic network security and applications of cryptography; mechanisms for controlling access and information flow; assurance of software and systems; auditing, intrusion detection, computer worms and viruses, and vulnerabilities; applications

Expanded Course Description:

  1. Introduction: what is security, policies, risk analysis, humans and procedural/operational security
  2. Foundations: access control matrix, Harrison-Ruzzo-Ullman result, Take-Grant Protection Model, other models
  3. Policy models: confidentiality (Bell-LaPadula, others); integrity (Biba, Clark-Wilson, others); hybrids (Chinese Wall, Clinical Information Systems Security, others); policy languages
  4. Basic cryptography: classical and public key cryptosystems, protocols, authentication
  5. Applications to systems: representation of identity, principles of secure design, access control mechanisms, information flow and confinement problem
  6. Assurance: formal methods of design (HDM, PVS, others); program verification; testing; informal applications to programming
  7. System analysis: auditing, malicious logic (Trojan horses, computer1worms, viruses), vulnerabilities analysis, intrusion detection

Textbook:
Instructor's notes and journal/conference papers

Paper/Project
Paper surveying a topic in computer security in depth (expected length 20 pages) or a project exploring some aspect of computer security sufficient to produce a conference paper.

Instructor: M. Bishop

Prepared by: M. Bishop (September 2002)

Overlap Statement:
This course does not have a significant overlap with any other course. There is some overlap with ECS 153, but that course focuses on the applications of the theory, whereas ECS 235 focuses on the theory underlying the applications. ECS 235 covers some of the same general topics as ECS 227 and ECS 228 but at a more applied and system-related level.

9/02

Back to Course Descriptions