Abu Dhabi based TII teams up with Purdue University on drone cybersecurity project

Abu Dhabi based Technology Innovation Institute (TII) is partnering with America’s Purdue University to research cybersecurity tools for drones operating in urban areas.

Drones or unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) are vulnerable to sophisticated cyberattacks in their communication, navigation, surveillance, and command and control protocols.

The research project comprises four phases of development. First, it will carry out modelling and analysis of UAS security. Second, it will develop algorithms and methodologies for high-assurance autonomy. Third, it will construct an experimental environment and work to simulate safe and secure urban UAS operations. Finally, it will test and validate mitigation strategies in a scaled, mixed-reality testbed.

This three-year project will be conducted at TII’s Secure Systems Research Centre and led by Prof. Inseok Hwang as the principal investigator, joined by Prof. James Goppert and Prof. Dongyan Xu, all from Purdue.

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As part of their work on the project, Prof. Hwang will assess potential cyberattacks on the systems, Prof. Xu will conduct resource-efficient encryption, multi-UAS communications, and other research from the cyber perspective while Prof. Goppert will test the drones in a special mixed reality environment he will design and build.

“We are delighted to have the Purdue Team led by Prof. Inseok Hwang of School of Aeronautics and Astronautics partner on making cyber-physical and autonomous systems secure and resilient to malware using their state of the art autonomous drone testing facility,” said Dr Shreekant Thakkar, chief researcher at the Secure Systems Research Centre.

“This will enable commercial autonomous drones and robots’ growth in the UAE and worldwide, opening new opportunities to enterprises and making their use safer for all people.”