Document Open Access Logo

Limited-Preemption EDF Scheduling for Multi-Phase Secure Tasks

Authors Benjamin Standaert , Fatima Raadia , Marion Sudvarg , Sanjoy Baruah , Thidapat Chantem , Nathan Fisher , Christopher Gill

PDF

File

Thumbnail PDF
PDF
LITES.10.1.3.pdf
  • Filesize: 5.16 MB
  • 27 pages

Document Identifiers

Subject Classification

ACM Subject Classification
  • Computer systems organization → Real-time systems
Keywords
  • real-time systems
  • limited-preemption scheduling
  • trusted execution environments

Metrics

  • Access Statistics
  • Total Accesses (updated on a weekly basis)
    0
    PDF Downloads
    0
    Metadata Views

Abstract

Safety-critical embedded systems such as autonomous vehicles typically have only very limited computational capabilities on board that must be carefully managed to provide required enhanced functionalities. As these systems become more complex and inter-connected, some parts may need to be secured to prevent unauthorized access, or isolated to ensure correctness.
We propose the multi-phase secure (MPS) task model as a natural extension of the widely used sporadic task model for modeling both the timing and the security (and isolation) requirements for such systems. Under MPS, task phases reflect execution using different security mechanisms which each have associated execution time costs for startup and teardown. We develop corresponding limited-preemption EDF scheduling algorithms and associated pseudo-polynomial schedulability tests for constrained-deadline MPS tasks. In doing so, we provide a correction to a long-standing schedulability condition for EDF under limited-preemption. Evaluation shows that the proposed tests are efficient to compute for bounded utilizations. We empirically demonstrate that the MPS model successfully schedules more task sets compared to non-preemptive approaches.

Cite As Get BibTex

Benjamin Standaert, Fatima Raadia, Marion Sudvarg, Sanjoy Baruah, Thidapat Chantem, Nathan Fisher, and Christopher Gill. Limited-Preemption EDF Scheduling for Multi-Phase Secure Tasks. In LITES, Volume 10, Issue 1 (2025). Leibniz Transactions on Embedded Systems, Volume 10, Issue 1, pp. 3:1-3:27, Schloss Dagstuhl – Leibniz-Zentrum für Informatik (2025) https://doi.org/10.4230/LITES.10.1.3

Author Details

Benjamin Standaert
  • Washington University, St. Louis, MO, United States
Fatima Raadia
  • Wayne State University, Detroit, MI, USA
Marion Sudvarg
  • Washington University, St. Louis, MO, United States
Sanjoy Baruah
  • Washington University, St. Louis, MO, United States
Thidapat Chantem
  • Virginia Tech, Blacksburg, VA, USA
Nathan Fisher
  • Wayne State University, Detroit, MI, USA
Christopher Gill
  • Washington University, St. Louis, MO, United States

Funding

This research was supported in part by NSF Grants CPS-1932530, CNS-2141256, CNS-2229290, IIS-1724227, CNS-2038609, CCF-2118202, CNS-2211641, and CPS-2038726.

Acknowledgements

We, the authors, would like to thank the reviewers for their constructive remarks.

References

  1. N. C. Audsley, A. Burns, R. I. Davis, K. W. Tindell, and A. J. Wellings. Fixed priority preemptive scheduling: An historical perspective. Real-Time Systems, 8:173-198, 1995. URL: https://doi.org/10.1007/BF01094342.
  2. Mohammad Fakhruddin Babar and Monowar Hasan. Deeptrust^RT: Confidential deep neural inference meets real-time! In Rodolfo Pellizzoni, editor, 36th Euromicro Conference on Real-Time Systems, ECRTS 2024, July 9-12, 2024, Lille, France, volume 298 of LIPIcs, pages 13:1-13:24. Schloss Dagstuhl - Leibniz-Zentrum für Informatik, Schloss Dagstuhl - Leibniz-Zentrum für Informatik, 2024. URL: https://doi.org/10.4230/LIPIcs.ECRTS.2024.13.
  3. Sanjoy Baruah, Thidapat Chantem, Nathan Fisher, and Fatima Raadia. A scheduling model inspired by security considerations. In 2023 IEEE 26th International Symposium on Real-Time Distributed Computing (ISORC), pages 32-41, 2023. URL: https://doi.org/10.1109/ISORC58943.2023.00016.
  4. Sanjoy K. Baruah. The limited-preemption uniprocessor scheduling of sporadic task systems. In 17th Euromicro Conference on Real-Time Systems (ECRTS 2005), 6-8 July 2005, Palma de Mallorca, Spain, Proceedings, pages 137-144. IEEE Computer Society, 2005. URL: https://doi.org/10.1109/ECRTS.2005.32.
  5. Sanjoy K. Baruah. Security-cognizant real-time scheduling. In 25th IEEE International Symposium On Real-Time Distributed Computing, ISORC 2022, Västerås, Sweden, May 17-18, 2022, pages 1-9. IEEE, 2022. URL: https://doi.org/10.1109/ISORC52572.2022.9812766.
  6. Sanjoy K. Baruah and Nathan Fisher. Choosing preemption points to minimize typical running times. In Proceedings of the 27th International Conference on Real-Time Networks and Systems, RTNS 2019, Toulouse, France, November 06-08, 2019, RTNS '19, pages 198-208, New York, NY, USA, 2019. Association for Computing Machinery. URL: https://doi.org/10.1145/3356401.3356407.
  7. Sanjoy K. Baruah, Aloysius K. Mok, and Louis E. Rosier. Preemptively scheduling hard-real-time sporadic tasks on one processor. In Proceedings of the Real-Time Systems Symposium - 1990, Lake Buena Vista, Florida, USA, December 1990, pages 182-190, Orlando, Florida, 1990. IEEE Computer Society. URL: https://doi.org/10.1109/REAL.1990.128746.
  8. Sanjoy K Baruah, Louis E Rosier, and Rodney R Howell. Algorithms and complexity concerning the preemptive scheduling of periodic, real-time tasks on one processor. Real-Time Syst., 2(4):301-324, November 1990. URL: https://doi.org/10.1007/BF01995675.
  9. Marko Bertogna and Sanjoy K. Baruah. Limited preemption EDF scheduling of sporadic task systems. IEEE Trans. Ind. Informatics, 6(4):579-591, 2010. URL: https://doi.org/10.1109/TII.2010.2049654.
  10. Marko Bertogna, Giorgio Buttazzo, Mauro Marinoni, Gang Yao, Francesco Esposito, and Marco Caccamo. Preemption Points Placement for Sporadic Task Sets. In 2010 22nd Euromicro Conference on Real-Time Systems, pages 251-260, 2010. URL: https://doi.org/10.1109/ECRTS.2010.9.
  11. Marko Bertogna, Orges Xhani, Mauro Marinoni, Francesco Esposito, and Giorgio Buttazzo. Optimal selection of preemption points to minimize preemption overhead. In 2011 23rd Euromicro Conference on Real-Time Systems, pages 217-227. IEEE, 2011. URL: https://doi.org/10.1109/ECRTS.2011.28.
  12. Enrico Bini and Giorgio C Buttazzo. Measuring the performance of schedulability tests. Real-Time Systems, 30(1-2), 2005. URL: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11241-005-0507-9.
  13. Giorgio C Buttazzo, Marko Bertogna, and Gang Yao. Limited preemptive scheduling for real-time systems. a survey. IEEE Trans. Industr. Inform., 9(1):3-15, February 2013. URL: https://doi.org/10.1109/TII.2012.2188805.
  14. John Cavicchio and Nathan Fisher. Integrating preemption thresholds with limited preemption scheduling. In 2020 IEEE 26th International Conference on Embedded and Real-Time Computing Systems and Applications (RTCSA). IEEE, August 2020. URL: https://doi.org/10.1109/RTCSA50079.2020.9203646.
  15. Friedrich Eisenbrand and Thomas Rothvoß. EDF-schedulability of synchronous periodic task systems is coNP-hard. In Moses Charikar, editor, Proceedings of the Twenty-First Annual ACM-SIAM Symposium on Discrete Algorithms, SODA 2010, Austin, Texas, USA, January 17-19, 2010, pages 1029-1034. SIAM, January 2010. URL: https://doi.org/10.1137/1.9781611973075.83.
  16. Pontus Ekberg. Models and Complexity Results in Real-Time Scheduling Theory. PhD thesis, Uppsala University, Sweden, 2015. URL: https://nbn-resolving.org/urn:nbn:se:uu:diva-267017.
  17. Pontus Ekberg and Wang Yi. Uniprocessor feasibility of sporadic tasks remains conp-complete under bounded utilization. In 2015 IEEE Real-Time Systems Symposium, RTSS 2015, San Antonio, Texas, USA, December 1-4, 2015, pages 87-95. IEEE Computer Society, 2015. URL: https://doi.org/10.1109/RTSS.2015.16.
  18. Pontus Ekberg and Wang Yi. Uniprocessor feasibility of sporadic tasks with constrained deadlines is strongly conp-complete. In 27th Euromicro Conference on Real-Time Systems, ECRTS 2015, Lund, Sweden, July 8-10, 2015, pages 281-286. IEEE Computer Society, 2015. URL: https://doi.org/10.1109/ECRTS.2015.32.
  19. P. Emberson, R. Stafford, and R.I. Davis. Techniques for the synthesis of multiprocessor tasksets. In WATERS workshop at the Euromicro Conference on Real-Time Systems, pages 6-11, July 2010. 1st International Workshop on Analysis Tools and Methodologies for Embedded and Real-time Systems ; Conference date: 06-07-2010. Google Scholar
  20. Ke Jiang, Adrian Alin Lifa, Petru Eles, Zebo Peng, and Wei Jiang. Energy-aware design of secure multi-mode real-time embedded systems with FPGA co-processors. In Michel Auguin, Robert de Simone, Robert I. Davis, and Emmanuel Grolleau, editors, 21st International Conference on Real-Time Networks and Systems, RTNS 2013, Sophia Antipolis, France, October 17-18, 2013, pages 109-118. ACM, October 2013. URL: https://doi.org/10.1145/2516821.2516830.
  21. Cailani Lemieux-Mack, Kevin Leach, Ning Zhang, Sanjoy Baruah, and Bryan C Ward. Optimizing runtime security in real-time embedded systems. In Proc. of Workshop on Optimization for Embedded and Real-time Systems (OPERA), December 2024. Google Scholar
  22. Sandro Di Leonardi, Federico Aromolo, Pietro Fara, Gabriele Serra, Daniel Casini, Alessandro Biondi, and Giorgio C. Buttazzo. Maximizing the security level of real-time software while preserving temporal constraints. IEEE Access, 11:35591-35607, 2023. URL: https://doi.org/10.1109/ACCESS.2023.3264671.
  23. M. Lin, L. Xu, L.T. Yang, X. Qin, N. Zheng, Z. Wu, and M. Qiu. Static security optimization for real-time systems. IEEEII, 5(1):22-37, February 2009. URL: https://doi.org/10.1109/TII.2009.2014055.
  24. C. Liu and J. Layland. Scheduling algorithms for multiprogramming in a hard real-time environment. Journal of the ACM, 20(1):46-61, 1973. URL: https://doi.org/10.1145/321738.321743.
  25. Yin Liu, Siddharth Dhar, and Eli Tilevich. Only pay for what you need: Detecting and removing unnecessary TEE-based code. Journal of Systems and Software, 188:111253, 2022. Publisher: Elsevier. URL: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jss.2022.111253.
  26. Yue Ma, Wei Jiang, Nan Sang, and Xia Zhang. ARCSM: A distributed feedback control mechanism for security-critical real-time system. In 10th IEEE International Symposium on Parallel and Distributed Processing with Applications, ISPA 2012, Leganes, Madrid, Spain, July 10-13, 2012, pages 379-386. IEEE Computer Society, July 2012. URL: https://doi.org/10.1109/ISPA.2012.56.
  27. Filip Markovic, Jan Carlson, Radu Dobrin, Bjorn Lisper, and Abhilash Thekkilakattil. Probabilistic response time analysis for fixed preemption point selection. In 2018 IEEE 13th International Symposium on Industrial Embedded Systems (SIES), pages 1-10, 2018. URL: https://doi.org/10.1109/SIES.2018.8442099.
  28. Filip Marković, Jan Carlson, and Radu Dobrin. Cache-aware response time analysis for real-time tasks with fixed preemption points. In 2020 IEEE Real-Time and Embedded Technology and Applications Symposium (RTAS), pages 30-42, 2020. URL: https://doi.org/10.1109/RTAS48715.2020.00-19.
  29. Jonathan M McCune, Bryan J Parno, Adrian Perrig, Michael K Reiter, and Hiroshi Isozaki. Flicker: An execution infrastructure for TCB minimization. In Proceedings of the 3rd ACM SIGOPS/EuroSys European Conference on Computer Systems 2008, pages 315-328, 2008. URL: https://doi.org/10.1145/1352592.1352625.
  30. Tanmaya Mishra, Thidapat Chantem, and Ryan M. Gerdes. Teecheck: Securing intra-vehicular communication using trusted execution. In 28th International Conference on Real Time Networks and Systems, RTNS 2020, Paris, France, June 10, 2020, RTNS 2020, pages 128-138, New York, NY, USA, 2020. Association for Computing Machinery. URL: https://doi.org/10.1145/3394810.3394822.
  31. Sibin Mohan, Man Ki Yoon, Rodolfo Pellizzoni, and Rakesh Bobba. Real-time systems security through scheduler constraints. In Proceedings of the 2014 Agile Conference, AGILE '14, pages 129-140, 2014. URL: https://doi.org/10.1109/ECRTS.2014.28.
  32. Anway Mukherjee, Tanmaya Mishra, Thidapat Chantem, Nathan Fisher, and Ryan M. Gerdes. Optimized trusted execution for hard real-time applications on COTS processors. In Proceedings of the 27th International Conference on Real-Time Networks and Systems, RTNS 2019, Toulouse, France, November 06-08, 2019, RTNS '19, pages 50-60, New York, NY, USA, 2019. Association for Computing Machinery. URL: https://doi.org/10.1145/3356401.3356419.
  33. M. Nasri, T. Chantem, G. Bloom, and R. M. Gerdes. On the pitfalls and vulnerabilities of schedule randomization against schedule-based attacks. In 2019 IEEE Real-Time and Embedded Technology and Applications Symposium (RTAS), pages 103-116, April 2019. URL: https://doi.org/10.1109/RTAS.2019.00017.
  34. Mitra Nasri, Geoffrey Nelissen, and Gerhard Fohler. A new approach for limited preemptive scheduling in systems with preemption overhead. In 28th Euromicro Conference on Real-Time Systems, ECRTS 2016, Toulouse, France, July 5-8, 2016, pages 25-35. IEEE Computer Society, July 2016. URL: https://doi.org/10.1109/ECRTS.2016.15.
  35. OP-TEE. URL: https://www.trustedfirmware.org/projects/op-tee/.
  36. OP-TEE Documentation: Core: Pager. URL: https://optee.readthedocs.io/en/latest/architecture/core.html#pager.
  37. Miroslav Pajic, Nicola Bezzo, James Weimer, Rajeev Alur, Rahul Mangharam, Nathan Michael, George J. Pappas, Oleg Sokolsky, Paulo Tabuada, Stephanie Weirich, and Insup Lee. Towards synthesis of platform-aware attack-resilient control systems. In Linda Bushnell, Larry Rohrbough, Saurabh Amin, and Xenofon D. Koutsoukos, editors, 2nd ACM International Conference on High Confidence Networked Systems (part of CPS Week), HiCoNS 2013, Philadelphia, PA, USA, April 9-11, 2013, pages 75-76. ACM, April 2013. URL: https://doi.org/10.1145/2461446.2461457.
  38. Fatima Raadia, Nathan Fisher, Thidapat Chantem, and Sanjoy Baruah. An improved security-cognizant scheduling model. In 2024 IEEE 27th International Symposium on Real-Time Distributed Computing (ISORC), pages 1-8. IEEE, 2024. URL: https://doi.org/10.1109/ISORC61049.2024.10551349.
  39. Jinwen Wang, Ao Li, Haoran Li, Chenyang Lu, and Ning Zhang. Rt-tee: Real-time system availability for cyber-physical systems using arm trustzone. In 2022 IEEE Symposium on Security and Privacy (SP), pages 352-369. IEEE, 2022. URL: https://doi.org/10.1109/SP46214.2022.9833604.
  40. Yujie Wang, Cailani Lemieux-Mack, Thidapat Chantem, Sanjoy Baruah, Ning Zhang, and Bryan C Ward. Partial context-sensitive pointer integrity for real-time embedded systems. In 2024 IEEE Real-Time Systems Symposium (RTSS), pages 415-426. IEEE Computer Society, 2024. URL: https://doi.org/10.1109/RTSS62706.2024.00042.
  41. T. Xie and X. Qin. Scheduling security-critical real-time applications on clusters. IEEE Transactions on Computers, 55(7):864-879, July 2006. URL: https://doi.org/10.1109/TC.2006.110.
  42. Gang Yao, Giorgio Buttazzo, and Marko Bertogna. Feasibility analysis under fixed priority scheduling with fixed preemption points. In 2010 IEEE 16th International Conference on Embedded and Real-Time Computing Systems and Applications, pages 71-80, 2010. URL: https://doi.org/10.1109/RTCSA.2010.40.
  43. Gang Yao, Giorgio Buttazzo, and Marko Bertogna. Feasibility analysis under fixed priority scheduling with limited preemptions. Real-Time Systems, 47(3):198-223, 2011. Publisher: Springer. URL: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11241-010-9113-6.
  44. Man-Ki Yoon, Sibin Mohan, Chien-Ying Chen, and Lui Sha. Taskshuffler: A schedule randomization protocol for obfuscation against timing inference attacks in real-time systems. In 2016 IEEE Real-Time and Embedded Technology and Applications Symposium (RTAS), Vienna, Austria, April 11-14, 2016, pages 111-122. IEEE, IEEE Computer Society, 2016. URL: https://doi.org/10.1109/RTAS.2016.7461362.
Questions / Remarks / Feedback
X

Feedback for Dagstuhl Publishing


Thanks for your feedback!

Feedback submitted

Could not send message

Please try again later or send an E-mail
© 2023-2025 Schloss Dagstuhl – LZI GmbH About DROPS Imprint Privacy Contact