5STARS Boost: Refining 5STARS Network Verification Technology for Transition

In the 5STARS project we aim to leverage deep network verification technologies that recently “escaped the lab”, improve them, and tailor them for operational use within Navy networks. Deep network verification technologies have attractive properties that has led to their adoption in commercial cloud datacenters, namely that they are: (1) fully automated meaning they minimizing reliance on expert training to operate, (2) passive meaning they can enhance and secure a network without probing infrastructure or sampling network traffic, (3) proactive meaning they can identify problems in the network before bad effects are observed such as failure to deliver packets or an adversary exploiting a vulnerability, and (4) exhaustive meaning they model “all possible packets and all possible paths” that could flow throughout a network including every possible corner case. Deep network verification technologies can also be deployed non-invasively in a wide range of operating scenarios, from integration alongside existing network infrastructure within a legacy platform (e.g., as a plug-in—not a component replacement), to direct integration with modern SDN controllers, DevSecOps platforms, CI/CD pipelines, and cloud-based staging and simulation environments. In this proposed Subsequent Phase II we aim to close the remaining gaps that have proved obstacles to transition and establish a close and collaborative transition customer relationship. To achieve this we will (1) develop new transition-relevant functional capabilities in alignment with PEO C4I portfolio initiatives, (2) integrate with transition-relevant networking platforms, and (3) build demonstrators that highlight 5STARS relevance for mission priorities related to network performance and security. This scope will achieve TRL 6 in a simulated operational environment. The new transition-relevant network properties we will develop in this phase of the project are network resource analysis—to support transition use cases related to guaranteed network availability and network resource provisioning—and AI-based network model learning—to support transition use cases that interface Navy/DoD networks with non-DoD networks, e.g., commercial, ISP, satellite, coalition networks, or even gray networks. We will create a baseline demonstration platform for 5STARS by integrating with open source SDN, network simulation and CI/CD platforms. To prove viability for integration with transition-relevant network we will extend this baseline demonstrator to integrate with a notional (to allow unclassified/non-CUI/non-ITAR experimentation) and real (potentially classified/CUI/ITAR) transition network platform. Finally, to demonstrate transition-relevant use cases and network operation workflows we will build three end-to-end demonstrators: proactive network monitoring, DevSecOps and CI/CD integration, and zero trust anomaly detection.