Whether we’re talking Fort Knox, a bank, business or corporation, one’s own electronic ID, or, perhaps even the DoD, one topic is on everyone’s minds: Security. Consequently, more secure RTOSs and even middleware are taking up quite a bit of space in print magazines and on bloggers’ websites. Thus, Real-Time Innovations (RTI) has wisely decided to follow the security trend with its RTI Data Distribution Service middleware – now integrated with Security-Enhanced Linux (SELinux) to boost security among distributed apps.
The integration – which meets strict commercial and government security specifications such as DoD 8500.2, DCID 6/3 PL4, NIST 800-53, HIPPA, SOX, and PCI – melds RTI Data Distribution Service middleware’s network communications with SELinux’s Mandatory Access Control (MAC) facilities. So basically, while the middleware is rendering secure data and message exchanges via encryption and authenticating peers, SELinux grants many extra protection levels against application vulnerabilities, misconfiguration, and software errors. One of two primary facilitators is the integration’s security policies, systemwide, that allow only applications explicitly provisioned to communicate with one another to do so, even though the apps might have appropriate credentials. Secondly, all files holding configuration info and logs or keys are kept safe from illegitimate access. Is there a downside? A miniscule 2 percent latency increase is reported for SELinux. We think it’s worth it; now you decide.