An architectural approach for assessing system trust based on security policy specifications and security mechanisms

We investigate trust relationships between and within a security policy and a security mechanism to assess system trust of software application. It has been recognized that trust assessment of security systems in dynamic environments with multiple entities, each with its own changing needs from the security mechanisms, is a complex task. In this paper, we propose a novel architectural approach to assess system trust of service oriented environments. The primary goal of this architecture is to show a way for constructing an automated system for trust assessment of web services. Particularly, we consider beliefs of an entity about a specific security mechanism of a service and the behavior of the service. In addition, we present new trust metrics for assessing system trust of a web service. Furthermore, trust and trust related issues in literature are reviewed to make clear the pros of our approach for trust assessment.