lowRISC Extends UKRI’s Digital Security by Design Programme Support Into Operational Technology

UK Research and Innovation (UKRI) recently announced that its CHERI-based Digital Security by Design Programme (DSbD) technologies have already demonstrated significant value in sectors where high integrity, resilient, and safety-focused applications are paramount, including avionics, automotive and embedded systems.

DSbD aims to provide foundational support to developers centred around a technology enhancement in the central processor (CPU): Capability Hardware Enhanced RISC Instructions, or (CHERI). CHERI has the potential to prevent around 2/3rds of current exploits, whilst simultaneously providing new software methods to help maintain the operational resilience and integrity of applications.

As part of a drive to ensure these advances are usable in the challenging operational technology (OT) domain as well as the more fully-featured platforms to which they were originally targeted, we are delighted to report that this announcement also included significant funding for a new project with lowRISC CIC.

lowRISC are seeking input from interested parties on the requirements for the BV (base-version). In particular they are interested to hear about peripherals and interfaces that would be useful to those seeking to evaluate CHERIoT for use with their applications.

Please submit your comments by 25th September.