PROJECT TITLE :

Modelling and analysis of rule-based network security middleboxes

ABSTRACT:

This study presents an analytical model for rule-based network security middleboxes as those of network firewalls, intrusion detection systems and email spam filters. In these systems, incoming packets carrying requests arrive at the middlebox and obtain queued for processing in multiple stages. The stages accommodates first a main stage for packet processing and then subsequent stages of rulebase interrogation in which rules or conditions are checked sequentially till a match is triggered. The service at these stages is characterised to be mutually exclusive; that's, solely one stage is active at any time. The authors derive helpful formulas that can predict the middlebox performance, taking under consideration its incoming request rate, the queue size and therefore the processing capability of the middlebox, and thereby proper engineering capability of the middlebox can be achieved.