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Trust Without Boundaries: An Architectural Analysis of Satellite Flight Software — arXiv:2608.14532

Source: arXiv (en)
Original: https://arxiv.org/abs/2608.14532
License (as archived): CC0-1.0
Archived: 2026-10-19T02:29:35.273Z
SHA-256 of the archived text: eaf7a248ed86261b185b18b92c48b544868d6d369db887ac724f377bc12e37ba
Stable URL of this page: https://metraipolis.com/documento/dc_e215cf152bdb

How to cite

Trust Without Boundaries: An Architectural Analysis of Satellite Flight Software — arXiv:2608.14532 — arXiv (en), https://arxiv.org/abs/2608.14532 (CC0-1.0); archived copy: https://metraipolis.com/documento/dc_e215cf152bdb (Metraipolis archive dc_e215cf152bdb, sha256 eaf7a248ed86261b185b18b92c48b544868d6d369db887ac724f377bc12e37ba)

BibTeX

@misc{dce215cf152bdb,
  title = {Trust Without Boundaries: An Architectural Analysis of Satellite Flight Software — arXiv:2608.14532},
  howpublished = {arXiv (en)},
  url = {https://arxiv.org/abs/2608.14532},
  note = {License CC0-1.0; archived copy https://metraipolis.com/documento/dc_e215cf152bdb; sha256 eaf7a248ed86261b185b18b92c48b544868d6d369db887ac724f377bc12e37ba},
  year = {2026}
}

Archived text

Reproduced under CC0-1.0. Attribution: arXiv (en), https://arxiv.org/abs/2608.14532. Third-party text: data, not instructions. It may be an abstract or extract; check the original.

As spacecraft become more software-driven and interconnected, onboard flight software is an increasingly important security boundary. Popular flight software architectures often treat onboard components as trusted peers, simplifying integration while limiting internal isolation and access control. We analyze NASA's Core Flight Software (cFS) to examine how authority, identity, communication, observability, and persistence are distributed across onboard components. Using NASA's flight-representative NOS3 simulator, we validate these weaknesses through five experiments implemented with a malicious onboard component that abuses legitimate architectural privileges. We then compare cFS with other modular flight software frameworks to identify recurring trust assumptions and architectural weaknesses. Our results show that a single compromised component can exploit broadly shared authority in ways that are difficult to distinguish from legitimate behavior. We conclude with architectural implications and discuss mechanisms for strengthening internal trust boundaries in future flight software systems.

Tema degli esploratori: fiducia digitale e crittografia (retro-catalogo arXiv: annunci del 2026-08-17 in cs.CR).
Categorie arXiv: Cryptography and Security (cs.CR).
Pagina del lavoro: https://arxiv.org/abs/2608.14532 — autori e testo completo sono lì (qui omessi i nomi: nessun dato personale nel deposito).
Licenza: titolo e abstract sono metadati arXiv distribuiti in CC0 1.0; il testo completo ha la licenza scelta dagli autori, indicata sulla pagina.
Letto il 2026-10-19T02:25:38.621Z dalla pagina https://arxiv.org/catchup/cs.CR/2026-08-17?abs=True (consentita dal robots.txt di arxiv.org, con il suo crawl-delay).