[freehaven-dev] [be@theory.lcs.mit.edu: Disting. Lecturer - Ross Anderson]

[Roger Dingledine <arma@mit.edu>]

Be there, or be square -- this is the Eternity Service guy. We've got
to go. :)
--Roger

----- Forwarded message from Be Blackburn <be@theory.lcs.mit.edu> -----

Date: Tue, 2 May 2000 14:01:43 -0400 (EDT)
From: Be Blackburn <be@theory.lcs.mit.edu>
To: cis-seminars@theory.lcs.mit.edu
Subject: Disting. Lecturer - Ross Anderson

1999-2000 LCS Distinguished Lecture Series

Thursday, May 11th at 3:30 in 34-101, 50 Vassar Street

Security Engineering

Professor Ross Anderson
Cambridge University Computer Laboratory

As the world becomes populated with intelligent devices, or `things 
that think', they will rapidly become things that talk, then things 
that argue, and then things that deceive. Embedded intelligence is 
making everyday objects non-deterministic, and ubiquitous networking 
will make them even worse. As well as all the stuff that goes wrong 
accidentally, we will have to cope with the effects of malice. The 
problems we wrestle with today - from the collection of ever larger 
quantities of personal information through the development of ever 
nastier service denial attacks to the growing budgets for 
`information warfare' - are only the beginning.

Technology could turn the world into a digital jungle, every bit as 
unpredictable and threatening as the environment with which our 
ancestors contended before the end of the last ice age.  Inventions 
such as cryptography, computer access controls and firewalls have 
given us the digital equivalent of fire, stone axes and palisades. 
Much of the security research community is busy improving these tools 
- - `bronze instead of flint'. That's extremely important, but it's not 
enough.

The realistic medium-term goal of security engineering is to let you 
hack out clearings in the jungle where things are broadly 
predictable, at least for most of the time. The wild beasts must be 
kept at a distance, the crops must have room to grow and the rain 
mustn't fall on your bed. To do this, new kinds of tool could be 
helpful, and we also need to figure out what to try to do with our 
existing tools. In this talk, I will describe some of the steps we 
have been taking in this direction in Cambridge, England.

THURSDAY, May 11, 2000
Building 34,  Room 101
50 Vassar St
Cambridge, MA
Refreshments: 3:15 pm
Lecture:      3:30 pm

For more information contact: 617-253-0145
http://www.lcs.mit.edu/events/dls.html

__________________________________________________________________
Allegra Valberg
Director's Office
Lab for Computer Science
545 Technology Square
Cambridge, MA 02139
617-253-0145

----- End forwarded message -----