lh-l4v/proof/infoflow/README.md

Confidentiality Proof

This proof establishes that seL4 enforces information flow, and so enforces the security property of confidentiality. Information flow security is defined in terms of (intransitive) noninterference, and implies confidentiality: data cannot be inferred without appropriate read authority. This proof is described in a 2013 IEEE Symposium on Security and Privacy paper. This proof firstly establishes noninterference for seL4's abstract specification, building on top of the Access Control Proof, before transferring the noninterference result to the kernel's C implementation via the Design Spec Refinement Proof and the C Refinement Proof.

Building

To build for the ARM architecture from the l4v/ directory, run:

L4V_ARCH=ARM ./run_tests InfoFlow

Important Theories

The top-level theory where noninterference is proved for the seL4 abstract specification is Noninterference; it is transferred to the C implementation via refinement in the theory Noninterference_Refinement. The base theory where noninterference is (generically) defined is Noninterference_Base. The bottom-level theory where confidentiality is formalised over the seL4 abstract specification is InfoFlow. Confidentiality is a relational property and the theory EquivValid defines these generically for the nondeterministic state monad of the abstract specification.