A domain-specific modeling framework for attack surface modeling

Cybersecurity is becoming vital as industries are gradually moving from automating physical processes to a higher level automation using cyber physical systems (CPS) and internet of things (IoT). In this context, security is becoming a continuous process that runs in parallel to other processes during the complete life cycle of a system. Traditional threat analysis methods use design models alongside threat models as an input for security analysis, hence missing the life-cycle-based dynamicity required by the security concern. In this paper, we argue for an attacker-aware systems modeling language that exposes the systems attack surfaces. For this purpose, we have designed Pimca, a domain specific modeling language geared towards capturing the attacker point of view of the system. This study introduces the formalism along with the Pimca workbench, a framework designed to ease the development and manipulation of the Pimca models. Finally, we present two relevant use cases, serving as a preliminary validation of our approach. © Copyright 2020 by SCITEPRESS - Science and Technology Publications, Lda. All rights reserved.