Data Integrity Limitations in Highly Secure Systems

Abstract : We discuss a class of computer/network architectures that supports multilevel security while utilizing commercial-off-the-shelf (COTS) workstations and COTS productivity software applications. We show that a property of these architectures is that, while supporting multilevel confidentiality policies, they do not generally support partially ordered integrity policies: specifically, these architectures do not support the maintenance of data that is higher in integrity than the integrity level of the COTS components.

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