Securing in-network traffic control systems

Title of the Talk:Securing in-network traffic control systems
Speakers: Ranjitha K
Host Faculty: Dr. Maria Francis
Date: Aug 13, 2025
Time: 04:00 pm to 05:00pm
Venue: CSE-LH-1

Abstract:
High-speed programmable data planes provide opportunities to design in-network systems that perform better for various network functions such as fast reroute, load balance, intrusion detection, in-network compute, and measurement. At the core, these in-network systems have a fast control loop; they monitor traffic and maintain a network state, infer network conditions from the state, and act by updating table rules or registers in the switch data plane. To keep decision-making fast, some systems implement all three tasks entirely in the data plane, and some have analysis at the control plane at the cost of slow decision-making.

Despite the benefits of such in-network systems, they increase the attack surface and are vulnerable to network attacks not seen before. Attackers can influence control decisions by sending adversarial traffic that pollutes the data plane state or tampering with messages that update/report the data plane state and table rules. In this talk, I will discuss two systems designed to secure fast control loop systems from adversarial manipulation by ensuring the authenticity and integrity of control messages that update/report the data plane state and table rules.

Bio:

Ranjitha K is a fifth-year PhD student at the Department of Computer Science and Engineering at the Indian Institute of Technology Hyderabad, working under Dr. Praveen Tammana. She works in computer networks and systems, focusing on cloud network monitoring, observability, programmable networks, and SDN