AVIATION CYBERSECURITY—FINDING LIFT, MINIMIZING DRAG
Airbus plant in Toulouse, France. Photo credit: Lomita/Wikimedia. standards that are practical, effective, and able to stand the test of time for these aircraft systems and the data produced.
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The aircraft control domain is comprised of systems and networks whose primary function is to support the safe operation of the aircraft.
Network Design
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The airline information services domain contains systems and networks that provide non-critical aircraft services and support interdomain connectivity.
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The Passenger Information and Entertainment Systems Domain (PIESD) provides and supports all passenger services such as entertainment, Internet connectivity, etc.
Aircraft designers are now expected not just to design the most aerodynamic exteriors, the most efficient engines, and the best passenger experience, but also to incorporate and exploit considerable computing power across the whole platform. This has resulted in aircraft networks evolving from simple, low bandwidth, point-topoint transfer of information to high bandwidth Transmission Control Protocol/Internet Protocol (TCP/IP) networks permitting considerably freer data flow than previously thought possible. Aircraft, like most other networks, are now a world of Wi-Fi routers, firewalls, and multi-core processors. Such networks are split into several aircraft data domains according to how much trust and assurance is required:
Although these domains have become standard terminology across the industry and appear simple, the underlying complexity may not be. When they were used by Boeing for their 787, the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) considered it a “. . . novel or unusual design feature . . .” that was not covered by airworthiness regulations at the time.27 The FAA requested that Boeing demonstrate the
27 “Special Conditions: Boeing Model 787-8 Airplane; Systems and Data Networks Security-Isolation or Protection From Unauthorized Passenger Domain Systems Access,” FAA, February 1, 2008, https://www.federalregister.gov/documents/2008/01/02/E7-25467/special-conditions-boeing-model-787-8-airplanesystems-and-data-networks-security-isolation-or.
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