In the automotive industry, we are experiencing a paradigm shift towards interconnected and autonomous vehicles. Traditionally, Electronic Control Units (ECUs) are deeply embedded systems where much of the control software is designed for the target vehicle and does not change significantly during the vehicle’s lifetime. To address the need for high-performance computing, communication mechanisms, and flexible software configuration, the AUTomotive Open System ARchitecture (AUTOSAR) consortium introduced AUTOSAR Adaptive, a standardized framework. To realize most of the system requirements we were going to connect multiple ECU's in a single network. This requires security assurance, possibly at its highest level.
AUTOSAR Adaptive provides a secure communication management system that uses different secure communication protocols, such as Service-Oriented Middleware on Ethernet (SOME/IP), Transport Layer Security (TLS), and Internet Protocol Security (IPSec) over Ethernet. AUTOSAR Adaptive establishes a secure foundation for deploying and managing software components by making use of cryptographic primitives provided by the crypto stack (ara::crypto), using secure communication protocols (ara::com), and implementing access control mechanisms (ara::iam). AUTOSAR Adaptive also provides a framework for Over-The-Air (OTA) updates, incorporating mechanisms for authentication, integrity verification, and rollback mechanism.
AUTOSAR Adaptive offers the flexibility to configure one or more crypto providers from various stack vendors. Depending on the specific application requirements, users can select a crypto provider available in the market. Semiconductor vendors are also providing the state of art hardware cores to safeguard the sensitive data and process complex crypto algorithms. Beyond the crypto stack, it is required to consider other critical aspects, including configuring Secure Boot, utilizing Kernel APIs for secure communication, vendor specific libraries and leveraging toolkits and utilities such as OpenSSL. This paper delves into the exploration of methods to fortify the system using a variety of security components present within AUTOSAR Adaptive. These components encompass the Crypto stack, which includes Crypto Primitives, Signature, Certificates, and the management of key material. We also probe into the IAM module that offers protection for access to sensitive resources. The discussion extends to the HSM (hardware security module), designed to execute pertinent security functions for applications that demand high confidentiality and authenticity. The primary focus lies in facilitating the use of secure crypto primitives in this context.