Harbor: software-based memory protection for sensor nodes

Many sensor nodes contain resource constrained microcontrollers where user level applications, operating system components, and device drivers share a single address space with no form of hardware memory protection. Programming errors in one application can easily corrupt the state of the operating system or other applications. In this paper, we propose Harbor, a memory protection system that prevents many forms of memory corruption. We use software based fault isolation (“sandboxing”) to restrict application memory accesses and control flow to protection domains within the address space. A flexible and efficient memory map data structure records ownership and layout information for memory regions; writes are validated using the memory map. Control flow integrity is preserved by maintaining a safe stack that stores return addresses in a protected memory region. Run-time checks validate computed control flow instructions. Cross domain calls perform low-overhead control transfe...

• Type: Conference
• Year: 2007
• Where: IPSN
• Authors: Ram Kumar, Eddie Kohler, Mani B. Srivastava
• Keywords: IPSN 2007, Memory Corruption, Memory Protection, Operating System, Sensor Networks