Security Protocol Definitions for ESA Ground and Space Segment Infrastructures, European Space Agency – European Space Operations Centre

During the last decade, the importance of information security within the network and internet community has been growing constantly. Every day, new kinds of cyber crimes, from disclosure of confidential data to fraud, are published. As the world became more and more connected, the topic has grown from a governmental or military problem to a day-to-day issue that affects everybody from governmental bodies down to private internet users.

With a certain delay, the same situation now applies to space communication systems. Many space agencies are realizing the growing importance of information security not only for military and governmental missions but also for peaceful scientific projects such as earth observation or planetary exploration. This development, together with the increasing usage of standardization for all kinds of protocols, interfaces and data structures, has led the agencies to formulate security requirements for many of their missions. Lack of appropriate standardization in the area of data security let to the development of proprietary solutions for every new mission with security requirements. Increasing development and maintenance costs were the results.

The goal of the project is to investigate different possibilites to secure space communications. This happens regarding aspects like transparency, implementation feasability, performance and generic application.

This project is a joined endeavour between the University of Luxembourg/SECAN-LAB and the European Space Agency (ESA) repesented through its European Space Operations Centre.