Final Resourcediscoverysecuritydistrsystems Thesis Linelarsen
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Resource discovery and Security in Distributed systems Resource discovery and Security in Distributed systems by Line Larsen Thesis is partial fulfilment of the degree of Master in Technology in Information and Communication Technology Agder University College Faculty of Engineering and Science Grimstad Norway May 2007 May 2007 – Line Larsen 1 Resource discovery and Security in Distributed systems Abstract To be able to access our files at any time and any where, we need a system or service which is free, has enough storage space and is secure. A centralized system can handle these challenges today, but does not have transparency, openness and scalability like a peer to peer network has. A hybrid system with characteristics from both distributed and centralized topologies is the ideal choice. In this paper I have gone through the basic theory of network topology, protocols and security and explained “search engine”, “Middleware”, “Distributed Hash Table” and the JXTA protocol. I then have briefly examined three existing peer to peer architectures which are “Efficient and Secure Information Sharing in Distributed, collaborative Environments” based on Sandbox and transitive delegation from 1999, pStore: A Secure Peer–to-Peer backup System” based on versioning and file blocks from 2001 and iDIBS from 2006, which is an improved versions of the SourceForge project Distributed Internet Backup System (DIBS) using Luby Transform codes instead of Reed-Solomon codes for error correction when reconstructing data. I have also looked into the security aspects related to using distributed systems for resource discovery and I have suggested a design of a resource discovery architecture which will use JXTA for backup of personal data using Super-peer nodes in a peer to peer architecture. Keywords Resource discovery, DHT, transitive delegation, middleware, heterogeneous networks, network security, hybrid architecture, peer to peer May 2007 – Line Larsen 2 Resource discovery and Security in Distributed systems Preface This thesis concludes the two-year Master of Science program in Information and Communication Technology (ICT) at Agder University College (AUC), Faculty of Engineering and Science in Grimstad, Norway. The workload of this thesis equals 30 ECTS and the project has been carried out from January to end of May 2007. I would like to thank, post Doc Ulf C. Carlsen, my supervisor at Agder University College, for excellent supervision and guidance throughout the project period. I appreciate that you came up with an Idea for a thesis when I did not like any of those that were originally proposed. Also I appreciate that you had not planned to be a supervisor at all this year and then you suddenly had two groups to supervise. Grimstad, May 2007 ___________________________ Line Larsen May 2007 – Line Larsen 3 Resource discovery and Security in Distributed systems Table of contents Abstract .................................................................................................................................. 2 Keywords ............................................................................................................................... 2 Preface.................................................................................................................................... 3 Table of contents .................................................................................................................... 4 Figure list................................................................................................................................6 1 INTRODUCTION.............................................................................................................. 7 1.1 Background ................................................................................................................ 7 1.2 Thesis definition......................................................................................................... 8 1.3 Problem statement...................................................................................................... 9 1.4 Importance of study.................................................................................................. 11 1.5 Report outline........................................................................................................... 11 2 THEORY AND STATE OF THE ART........................................................................... 12 2.1 Theory ...................................................................................................................... 12 2.1.1 Topology .......................................................................................................... 12 2.1.2 Algorithm and Protocols .................................................................................. 16 2.1.2.1 Communication protocol.............................................................................. 16 2.1.2.2 Routing algorithms....................................................................................... 17 2.1.2.3 Resource discovery (look-up service) algorithms........................................ 18 2.1.3 Security............................................................................................................. 20 2.1.3.1 The CIA of computer security...................................................................... 20 2.1.3.2 Secure data transmission .............................................................................. 21 2.1.3.3 Software security.......................................................................................... 23 2.1.3.4 Secure access................................................................................................ 24 2.1.3.5 Secure storage of data on hardware.............................................................. 26 2.2 Discovery services in use ......................................................................................... 27 2.2.1 Search engine ................................................................................................... 27 2.2.2 Middleware....................................................................................................... 28 2.2.3 Distributed Hash Table (DHT) algorithm ........................................................ 30 2.2.4 JXTA protocol.................................................................................................. 31 2.3 Requirements for a centralized system..................................................................... 32 2.4 Requirements for a distributed system ..................................................................... 33 2.5 Centralized versus Distributed ................................................................................. 34 2.6 “Resource discovery and Security” literature review .............................................. 35 3 SURVEY ON DIFFERENT CURRENT P2P ARCHITECTURES................................ 35 3.1 Peer to Peer systems................................................................................................. 35 3.2 Efficient and Secure Information Sharing in Distributed, collaborative Environment .................................................................................................................................. 37 3.3 pStore: A Secure Peer To Peer Backup system........................................................ 38 3.4 iDIBS: An Improved Distributed Backup System .................................................. 38 4 SECURITY REQUIREMENTS OF A SYSTEM............................................................ 39 4.1 Security policy.......................................................................................................... 39 4.2 Anonymity and Trustworthiness .............................................................................. 40 4.3 Physical security....................................................................................................... 41 5 DESIGN OF HYBRID ARCHITECTURE ..................................................................... 42 5.1 Topology .................................................................................................................. 42 5.2 Protocols and algorithms.......................................................................................... 42 5.3 Security..................................................................................................................... 44 May 2007 – Line Larsen 4 Resource discovery and Security in Distributed systems 6 DISCUSSION .................................................................................................................. 46 6.1 The 3 backup systems .............................................................................................. 46 6.1.1 Efficient and Secure information sharing......................................................... 46 6.1.2 pStore ............................................................................................................... 46 6.1.3 iDIBS................................................................................................................ 47 6.2 Security requirements of a system ........................................................................... 47 6.2.1 Topology .......................................................................................................... 47 6.2.2 Algorithms and protocols................................................................................. 47