Trusted operating systems
were originally designed to enforce military security policies on
government computers. However, with the growth of Internet-based
commerce, the need for TOS-based security is no longer restricted
to government environments.
"The threats posed by the modern computing environment
cannot be addressed without secure operating systems. Any security
effort which ignores this fact can only result in a 'fortress
built upon sand.'" (Loscocco,
1998)
Certain threats, such as buffer-overflow/stack-overwrite attacks,
administrator hijacking, multi-network communication, improper
application interaction, and other application software bugs,
can only be controlled via the operating system, which can impose
limits on all software.
A trusted operating system does not take the place of encryption,
intrusion detection, or authentication, but often makes a firewall
unnecessary. It strengthens all other security mechanisms. Trusted
OS's can create partitions for applications and resources, so
damage from compromised programs is limited.
Only trusted operating systems can provide the stability and
security required for critical commercial servers.
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