eprintid: 10041450
rev_number: 28
eprint_status: archive
userid: 608
dir: disk0/10/04/14/50
datestamp: 2018-01-16 12:57:52
lastmod: 2021-11-23 01:17:20
status_changed: 2018-02-02 10:53:09
type: proceedings_section
metadata_visibility: show
creators_name: Spring, JM
creators_name: Moore, T
creators_name: Pym, D
title: Practicing a Science of Security: A Philosophy of Science Perspective
ispublished: pub
divisions: UCL
divisions: B04
divisions: C05
divisions: F48
keywords: Security research; science of security; cybersecurity; history of science; philosophy of science; ethics of security
note: This version is the author accepted manuscript. For information on re-use, please refer to the publisher’s terms and conditions.
abstract: Our goal is to refocus the question about cybersecurity research from 'is this process scientific' to 'why is this scientific process producing unsatisfactory results'. We focus on five common complaints that claim cybersecurity is not or cannot be scientific. Many of these complaints presume views associated with the philosophical school known as Logical Empiricism that more recent scholarship has largely modified or rejected. Modern philosophy of science, supported by mathematical modeling methods, provides constructive resources to mitigate all purported challenges to a science of security. Therefore, we argue the community currently practices a science of cybersecurity. A philosophy of science perspective suggests the following form of practice: structured observation to seek intelligible explanations of phenomena, evaluating explanations in many ways, with specialized fields (including engineering and forensics) constraining explanations within their own expertise, inter-translating where necessary. A natural question to pursue in future work is how collecting, evaluating, and analyzing evidence for such explanations is different in security than other sciences.
date: 2017-10-01
date_type: published
publisher: Association for Computing Machinery (ACM)
official_url: http://dx.doi.org/10.1145/3171533.3171540
oa_status: green
full_text_type: other
language: eng
primo: open
primo_central: open_green
verified: verified_manual
elements_id: 1524842
doi: 10.1145/3171533.3171540
isbn_13: 9781450363846
lyricists_name: Pym, David
lyricists_name: Spring, Jonathan
lyricists_id: DPYMX87
lyricists_id: JSPRI00
actors_name: Spring, Jonathan
actors_id: JSPRI00
actors_role: owner
full_text_status: public
series: New Security Paradigms Workshop
volume: 2017
place_of_pub: New York, NY, USA
pagerange: 1-18
event_title: 2017 New Security Paradigms Workshop (NSPW 2017)
event_location: Santa Cruz, California, USA
event_dates: 01 October 2017 - 04 October 2017
institution: New Security Paradigms Workshop
book_title: NSPW 2017: Proceedings of the 2017 New Security Paradigms Workshop
citation:        Spring, JM;    Moore, T;    Pym, D;      (2017)    Practicing a Science of Security: A Philosophy of Science Perspective.                     In:  NSPW 2017: Proceedings of the 2017 New Security Paradigms Workshop.  (pp. pp. 1-18).  Association for Computing Machinery (ACM): New York, NY, USA.       Green open access   
 
document_url: https://discovery-pp.ucl.ac.uk/id/eprint/10041450/1/spring-moore-pym_2017_practicing-science-of-security.pdf