Asbestos : operating system security for mobile devices

Abstract

This thesis presents the design and implementation of a port of the Asbestos operating system to the ARM processor. The port to the ARM allows Asbestos to run on mobile devices such as cell phones and personal digital assistants. These mobile, wireless-enabled devices are at risk for data attacks because they store private data but often roam in public networks. The Asbestos operating system is designed to prevent disclosure of such data. The port includes a file system and a network driver, which together enable future development of Asbestos applications on the ARM platform. This thesis evaluates the port with a performance comparison between Asbestos running on an HP iPAQ hand held computer and the original x86 Asbestos.