Hosted by Alix Paultre, the Tinker’s Toolbox is the Advantage Design Group’s web-based interview show where we talk about the latest technology, components, and design issues for the electronic design engineering community.
In this podcast we talk to Alan Grau, President and CEO of Icon Labs on the issues of security in embedded systems. Icon Labs is an embedded systems software development company whose Floodgate Firewall with Stateful Packet Inspection is presented as the only embedded firewall providing complete protection against Internet-based attacks. Researchers from Columbia University’s Intrusion Detection Systems Lab have concluded that embedded devices are over 20 times more vulnerable to Internet-based threats than Enterprise Networks.
Here is a link to the podcast in case the play button isn’t working: Icon Labs Interview
Here is a link to a presentation on the company’s technology: Icon Labs Presentation
Here is a release on the Floodgate system:
Icon Labs (www.iconlabs.com) a leading provider of embedded networking and security technology, today announced the availability of Icon Labs’ Floodgate Firewall with Stateful Packet Inspection (SPI). With the addition of Stateful Packet Inspection, Floodgate is the only embedded firewall providing complete protection against Internet-based attacks.
Researchers from Columbia University’s Intrusion Detection Systems Lab have concluded that embedded devices are over 20 times more vulnerable to Internet-based threats than Enterprise Networks. As network connectivity in embedded devices becomes commonplace and our reliance on these devices grows, so has the importance of protecting these devices from Internet-based threats.
“Compared to industry standard firewalls, Floodgate is a lot smaller and can be integrated at the lowest layers in the network stacks,” said Alan Grau, CEO of Icon Labs. “The small size enables this firewall to be packaged into a wide range of Internet connected devices such as medical devices, utility monitoring systems, web cams, cable modems, routers and mobile devices including phones. Because it works at the lowest layer of the network stack, Floodgate provides the most comprehensive protection possible.”
Floodgate’s threshold-based filtering protects against denial of service attacks, broadcast storms, and other conditions that result in a flood of unwanted packets. Rules-based filtering allows white-listing and black-listing based on criteria such as port number, protocol, or source IP address. Stateful Packet Inspection (SPI) provides dynamic packet filtering based on the state of a connection.
Icon Labs’ Floodgate Firewall is provided as a portable source code library and is easily integrated with any embedded operating system and TCP/IP stack and has been ported to Green Hills Software’s INTEGRITY and VelOSity, Wind River’s VxWorks and LynuxWorks’ LynxOS. Floodgate makes it easy to add complete, configurable firewall protection to your product regardless of the embedded platform.
About Icon Laboratories, Inc.
Icon Labs is a leading provider of embedded networking and security solutions. Founded in 1992, Icon Labs is headquartered in West Des Moines, Iowa. For more information, visit www.iconlabs.com, send email to info@iconlabs.com, or call 1.888.235.3443 (U.S. and Canada) or 515.226.3443 (International).