Firewall Chip Gets Funding

LONDON -- EU funding of 2 million Euros has been announced for a major new three-year project to develop a re-configurable photonic 'firewall on a chip'. Called WISDOM, (WIrespeed Security Domains Using Optical Monitoring), the new system will plug a major gap in the global data network security armoury - the lack of tools to implement security checks and algorithms directly at high optical data communications rates.

WISDOM will complement current electronic security techniques with optical information filtering operating at wirespeed, and is being developed by a consortium led by the UK's CIP.

"Optical technology lies at the heart of the global electronic and computer-based communications systems on which we are all increasingly reliant," says Graeme Maxwell of project co-ordinator CIP. "It's the key to very high data speeds and very large information handling capacity. But we are still reliant on conventional electronic tools for key functions such as legal intercept, flow classification and performance monitoring. WISDOM technology will provide a scaleable and robust solution to key issues of next generation network security by allowing close inspection of optical data directly in the optical domain."

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