Andrew Loveless

I am a Ph.D. candidate in Computer Science and Engineering at the University of Michigan, where I am co-advised by Ron Dreslinski and Baris Kasikci. My interests are in developing techniques to make embedded systems more fault-tolerant and resilient to attacks, as well as to reduce the performance overhead of fault tolerance approaches already used in practice. My work spans multiple areas, including distributed systems, real-time systems. networking, and security.

I am also a civil servant in the Avionic Systems Division at NASA Johnson Space Center, where my focus is on the development of fault-tolerant avionic systems for manned spaceflight applications.

Curriculum Vitae: PDF

BBB Building Room 2317

Announcements

I successfully defended my Ph.D. thesis! group photo (Apr. 2023)
HEX-ML was accepted to appear at EuroS&P '23. Congrats Deepika! (Mar. 2023)
PCspooF was accepted to appear at S&P '23 (June 2022)
RBS was accepted to appear at DASC '22. Congrats Robert! (Jan. 2022)
Gatekeeper was accepted to appear at DASC '21. Congrats Brendan! (Jan. 2021)
IGOR was accepted to appear at RTAS '21 (Jan. 2021)
I am grateful to have been awarded a NASA Exceptional Technology Achievement Medal (Dec. 2020)
I am grateful to have been awarded an NSF Graduate Research Fellowship (Apr. 2020)

Publications

HEX-ML: A Hybrid Cryptographic-Hardware Solution for Oblivious Inference in the Cloud
D. Natarajan, A. Loveless, W. Dai, and R. Dreslinski
IEEE European Symposium on Security and Privacy (EuroS&P) 2023
PDF, Slides
Summary: Describes a new lightweight approach for privacy-ensuring machine learning in the cloud setting.
PCspooF: Compromising the Safety of Time-Triggered Ethernet
A. Loveless, L. T. X. Phan, R. Dreslinski, and B. Kasikci
IEEE Symposium on Security and Privacy (S&P) 2023
PDF, Slides, Talk
Summary: Describes a new attack that breaks the isolation guarantees of Time-Triggered Ethernet (TTE) by conducting EMI from a malicious device into a TTE switch over an Ethernet cable.
RBS: Profile-Guided Scheduling for Time-Triggered Applications
R. Esswein, B. Luksik, A. Loveless, and A. George
IEEE Digital Avionics Systems Conference (DASC) 2022
PDF, Slides, Talk
Summary: Describes a principled approach for reducing the bandwidth required to schedule time-triggered network traffic while still reaching a certain reliability target.
Gatekeeper: A Reliable Reconfiguration Protocol for Real-Time Ethernet Systems
B. Luksik, A. Loveless, and A. George
IEEE Digital Avionics Systems Conference (DASC) 2021 [Best Student Paper]
PDF, Slides, Talk
Summary: Describes a novel approach for correctly reconfiguring Time-Triggered Ethernet networks in the presence of faulty devices.
IGOR: Accelerating Byzantine Fault Tolerance for Real-Time Systems with Eager Execution
A. Loveless, R. Dreslinski, B. Kasikci, and L. T. X. Phan
IEEE Real-Time and Embedded Technology and Applications Symposium (RTAS) 2021
PDF, Slides, Teaser, Talk
Summary: Describes a new method for reducing the latency of real-time Byzantine fault-tolerant systems by speculatively executing on data from redundant sensors on different cores.
Optimal and Error-Free Multi-Valued Byzantine Consensus Through Parallel Execution
A. Loveless, R. Dreslinski, and B. Kasikci
IACR Cryptology ePrint Archive
PDF
Summary: Describes the first Byzantine extension protocol that is simultaneously communication-optimal, error-free, and only requires processes to broadcast one bit with a binary Byzantine broadcast protocol.
(Developed concurrently with and independently of this paper)
Development and Testing of a Vehicle Management System for Autonomous Spacecraft Habitat Operations
G. Aaseng, J. Frank, M. Iatauro, C. Knight, R. Levinson, J. Ossenfort, M. Scott, A. Sweet, J. Csank, J. Soeder, D. Carrejo, A. Loveless, T. Ngo, and Z. Greenwood
AIAA SPACE Forum and Exposition 2018
PDF
Summary: Describes work done collaboratively between NASA centers to design a vehicle management system to autonomously control a future deep space habitat.
A Proposed Byzantine Fault-Tolerant Voting Architecture using Time-Triggered Ethernet
A. Loveless, C. Fidi, and S. Wernitznigg
SAE AeroTech Congress & Exhibition 2017
Publisher, Slides
Summary: Describes how to construct a Byzantine fault-tolerant voting system based on Time-Triggered Ethernet that is suitable for safety-critical applications.
A Modular, Scalable Avionics Architecture for Future Exploration Missions
C. Fidi and A. Loveless
AIAA SPACE Forum and Exposition 2017
Publisher
Summary: Gives a high-level overview of TTTech's Time-Triggered Ethernet products and describes how their features can be used as a part of future spaceflight architectures.
Approach for Sizing and Turndown Analysis of a Variable Geometry Spacecraft Radiator
L. Erickson and A. Loveless
NESC Thermal and Fluids Analysis Workshop 2017
PDF, Slides
Summary: Describes a novel approach for analyzing a variable-geometry spacecraft radiator.
On TTEthernet for Integrated Fault-Tolerant Spacecraft Networks
A. Loveless
AIAA SPACE Forum and Exposition 2015
Publisher, PDF, Slides
Summary: Gives a general overview of how the Time-Triggered Ethernet protocol works and how it is being used in the NASA Advanced Exploration Systems Program.
On Augmented DVH Analysis
A. Loveless, A. Roy, I. Das, and O. Nohadani
AAPM Annual Meeting & Exhibition 2013
Publisher
Summary: Describes a novel method for quantifying the difference between radiation treatment plans that appear visually similar.

Select Presentations

Impact of Switch Plane Redundancy on Network Availability
Artemis Network Validation and Integration Laboratory (ANVIL) Education and Training
NASA JSC, Houston, TX, February 2022
Slides
On Time-Triggered Ethernet in NASA’s Lunar Gateway
Avionics Architectures Community of Practice Talk
NASA JSC, Houston, TX, July 2020
Slides
Building Compositional Systems with Time-Triggered Ethernet
ESA TTE/CFS/IMA Workshop
European Space Research and Technology Centre, Noordwijk, Netherlands, July 2018
Slides
Using Time-Triggered Ethernet in the Core Flight System
ESA TTE/CFS/IMA Workshop
European Space Research and Technology Centre, Noordwijk, Netherlands, July 2018
Slides
Mapping of SOIS Layering Concept to TTE/cFS
CCSDS Fall Technical Meetings
The Hague Marriott Hotel, The Hague, Netherlands, Nov. 2017
Slides
TTEthernet Development and CFS Integration
Deep Space Gateway Open Software Multi-lateral Technical Interchange Meeting
NASA JSC, Houston, TX, Sept. 2017
Slides
Overview of TTE/CFS Integration
CCSDS Spring Technical Meetings
Southwest Research Institute, San Antonio, TX, May 2017
Slides
Notional 1FT Voting Architecture with Time-Triggered Ethernet
Avionics and Software FY17 Planning Meeting
NASA JSC, Houston, TX, Nov. 2016
Slides
Overview of TTE Applications and Development at NASA/JSC
CCSDS Fall Technical Meetings
ASI, Rome, Italy, Oct. 2016
TTTech, Vienna, Austria, Oct. 2016
Slides

Press

November 2022 - PCspooF attack on TTE networks

University of Michigan Press Release
Ars Technica: "Researchers break security guarantees of TTE networking used in spacecraft"
The Hacker News: "PCspooF: New Vulnerability Affects Networking Tech Used by Spacecraft and Aircraft"
IEEE Spectrum: "New Ethernet Cyberattack Crunches Critical Systems"
Engadget: "NASA helped find a security hole in spacecraft networks"
TechRadar: "NASA uncovered a network security flaw that could affect spacecrafts"
The Hill: "Vulnerability identified in energy, space networks"
The Aerospace Corporation: "Introducing SPARTA using PCSpooF: Cyber Security for Space Missions"

January 2018 - The use of TTE in NASA spacecraft

NASA Spinoff Magazine: "Time-Triggered Ethernet Slims Down Critical Data Systems"

Interesting Links

List of actual observed failures in safety-critical systems Link
Byzantine-resilient ROBUS prototypes at LaRC Link
Ascent Abort 2 Lab at JSC (formerly in Building 9) Link Link Link
X-38 Crew Return Vehicle prototypes at JSC (formerly in Building 220) Link Link