IIT Madras partners with IDBI Bank to launch Cybersecurity Lab

Chennai: The Indian Institute of Technology Madras (IIT Madras) is partnering with IDBI Bank to launch a cybersecurity lab to develop and deploy security solutions in crucial sectors such as healthcare, fintech and aerospace, among others.

The lab will focus on creating market-ready IPs in cybersecurity, productisation and commercialisation of research work, especially for mobile technologies.

The ‘IDBI-IITM Secure Systems Lab’ (I2SSL) was inaugurated at the IIT Madras campus by Rakesh Sharma, managing director and CEO, of IDBI Bank, in the presence of Prof. V Kamakoti, director, of IIT Madras, many other prominent personalities and students.

What is the objective of Secure Systems Lab?

With the rapid growth of Internet connectivity and automation, many critical sectors such as Banking, Finance and Insurance, Transportation, Government, Power and Energy, Telecom, and Strategic and Public Enterprises, depend considerably on Information and Communication Technologies. This has led to an explosion of cyber-attacks on these infrastructures, by hackers.

This lab would focus on cybersecurity in systems deployed in industries such as banking, automotive, power and telecommunications, among others, and undertake experimental evaluation and assessment exercises. The researchers would also develop test cases for testing, carry out vulnerability research, and help devise hardening guidelines. It would help Enterprise Systems in managing cybersecurity risks in real time.

Focus on academics

The ‘IDBI - IITM Secure Systems Lab’ (I2SSL) will work on Secure Systems Engineering. Through this lab, the researchers aim to design and implement solutions that address security concerns from a holistic end-to-end perspective, ranging from fundamental problems in theory to practical system building to exploiting leakages and mounting implementation­-based attacks to the lab would provide a platform for research students and would foster cybersecurity thinking in undergrads with the help of online programs, capture the flags (CTFs), hackathons, and projects.

The I2SSL, IIT Madras, plans to ingeniously design systems for critical applications such as hardware firewalls, point-of-sale devices, and mobile banking. Security would be achieved using memory-safe languages, tagged architectures that provide fine-grained access control, memory encryption, and an ingeniously developed Trusted Platform Module (TPM).

The researchers also aim to create an online forum that would facilitate Al-based malware analysis. The forum would offer datasets of malware runtime behaviour facilitating students and researchers to study the malware execution behaviour. They would look into Linux, Windows, as well as Mobile malware.

Further, I2SSL will also work on developing tools for automated security evaluation. The researchers aim to develop tools for binary analysis that could facilitate the discovery of ‘Zero-Day Vulnerabilities’ and other security threats in devices, especially mobile applications. They would work towards standardisation and certification for device security, especially for mobile and embedded systems.

Speaking on the occasion, Rakesh Sharma said, “We are delighted to partner with IITM for setting up the cybersecurity laboratory. This initiative is a testament to IDBI Bank’s commitment to proactively combating cyber threats and ensuring the security of data and information. We are optimistic that through such initiatives, we can together enhance our ability to anticipate, identify, and neutralise potential threats building a more secure environment for all.”

Addressing the launch event, Prof. V Kamakoti said, “The finance sector being a critical information infrastructure that forms the foundation of the economy of our country is facing an increasing number of cybersecurity challenges on a day-to-day basis. It is very important to continuously keep studying the threat landscape and come out with effective proactive protection mechanisms. This joint effort between IIT Madras and IDBI is very timely and we aspire to comprehensively address the security challenge.”