English

Symbolic Timed Observational Equivalence

Logic in Computer Science 2018-12-18 v2

Abstract

Intruders can infer properties of a system by measuring the time it takes for the system to respond to some request of a given protocol, that is, by exploiting time side channels. These properties may help intruders distinguish whether a system is a honeypot or concrete system helping him avoid defense mechanisms, or track a user among others violating his privacy. Observational equivalence is the technical machinery used for verifying whether two systems are distinguishable. Moreover, efficient symbolic methods have been developed for automating the check of observational equivalence of systems. This paper introduces a novel definition of timed observational equivalence which also distinguishes systems according to their time side channels. Moreover, as our definition uses symbolic time constraints, it can be automated by using SMT-solvers.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.1801.04066,
  title  = {Symbolic Timed Observational Equivalence},
  author = {Vivek Nigam and Carolyn Talcott and Abrãao Aires Urquiza},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:1801.04066},
  year   = {2018}
}

Comments

New version with corrected Typos, improved motivation, explanation, better notation

R2 v1 2026-06-22T23:43:24.838Z